The Scottish Rogue
by Christine Morgan
Summary: Dead men tell no tales, but an immortal never forgets. Some violence and sexual content. #52 in an ongoing saga.


The Scottish Rogue   
by Christine Morgan   
christine@sabledrake.com / http://www.christine-morgan.org

  


* * *

  
Author's Note: the characters of Gargoyles are the property of Disney and used   
here without their creators' knowledge or permission. Latin by Tim Morgan   
(thanks, love!!!). Mature readers only due to sexual content and violence. 

#52 in an ongoing saga. 

_Bibliography:_   
**GURPS Swashbucklers,** by Steffan O'Sullivan;   
**Under the Black Flag -- the Romance and the Reality of Life Among the Pirates**,   
by David Cordingly.   


* * *

  
(Broadway, voice-over) Previously, on Gargoyles ...   
From "Tales from the Skiff" -- 

"You!" Reaper snarled. "This time, you _will_ die!"   
"I doubt it," MacBeth sighed, "but we can hope, can't we?"   
"_You_ put the spell on them?" Broadway blurted. "Sure, that makes   
sense! You must've had it in for gargoyles ever since Demona, but you're too   
noble to kill them --"   
"Noble!" Brand's sword sliced through the air. "He hunted us like   
animals!"   
"You attacked my town! Killed my wife!" MacBeth shot back.   
"Stole our lives from us!" Melusine screeched. "Not death, but strange   
waking in a world not our own! Now we have no clan, no ship, no future! And   
you, Rogue, will pay!"   
*********************************************************   


**_Three hundred years ago ..._**   
**_ Cannonfire and the cutlass ruled_**   
**_ It was a time of piracy_**   
**_ It was a world of greed_**   
**_ It was the age of ..._**   
**_ Gargoyles!_**   
**_ Wood by day, warriors by night_**   
**_ Betrayed by the crewmen we were sworn to protect_**   
**_ Frozen in wood by a magic spell_**   
**_ For three hundred years_**   
**_ Now, here in the Caribbean_**   
**_ The spell is broken_**   
**_ And we live again!_**

********************************************************* 

**Off the coast of the Bahamas**   
**April, 2000**

The gentle surf tilted the _Coral_ mildly this way and that. The sun had   
nearly reached the horizon, turning the sky into a pastel dream of pinks, oranges,   
and golds. All was an idyllic scene ... except that two of the men aboard the   
small vessel were on the verge of a fistfight while a third tried ineffectively to   
calm them down.   
"They were expecting us at six!" one man shouted. He was very tan,   
very fit, looked like he could have stepped right out of a travel agent's brochure.   
He thrust his watch into the other man's face. "At six!"   
"It's not my fault, Scott!" the other shouted back. He was, if anything,   
more tan and fit than his buddy.   
"Sirs, sirs, please!" The third man was much younger, eighteen if he   
was a day, with gorgeous coffee skin and lush black hair. "I'll fix the boat, and   
we're back by nine o'clock."   
"Nine!?!" the first man, Scott, gasped. "Are you crazy? I finally get   
Dana to come away with me, perfect romantic vacation, she'd give in, finally   
give in, and now we're stuck out here in the middle of the frigging ocean!"   
"He said he'll fix it --"   
"By the time we get back, she'll be in bed with some island stud, just to   
spite me! Why did I listen to you anyway? 'Hey, the girls want to go shopping,   
what say you and me do a little sport fishing?' You conehead! We didn't even   
catch any fish!"   
"Sirs, please --" the third man tried again.   
"I wouldn't blame Dana if she did," the second man snapped. "You've   
been a jerk all day! She knows the only reason you brought her here was to get   
into her pants."   
Roderigo shook his head and walked away muttering. Let them beat   
each other up, then, if that's what they wanted. He was going to take a look at the   
engine.   
He glumly realized that the men would probably want their money   
back. First no fish, as if that was his fault, and then the engine dies. If he'd only   
listened to his father, who had told him again and again that a sailboat was more   
reliable. But no, he'd had to insist that a motor was more reliable than the wind.   
When all the while, he'd just liked the motor better, liked being able to speed   
across the crystalline waters without having to wrestle with sails and lines.   
While he tinkered, he heard the argument continue above, but it seemed   
his customers weren't going to start punching after all. Then he heard their   
exclamations of surprise, as the dusk brought some fish to the surface. They   
would get their catch, at least.   
By the time he emerged onto the deck, scrubbing his hands with a rag,   
the sky had gone indigo and the sea shimmered beneath the diamond points of   
the first stars.   
The men seemed to have made their peace, or set aside their grievances   
long enough to do some fishing. The peace had been helped by the now mostly   
emptied cooler; their fishing hadn't particularly benefited.   
"Ready in five minutes?" Roderigo suggested.   
"Aw, what's the rush?" Scott said. "Dana's probably already got her legs   
wide open." He finished a beer and flipped the bottle over the side.   
"Hey, look!" the other man said, peering into the distance. "I see   
another boat!"   
Roderigo looked, and felt sudden nervousness worm its way into his   
heart. Another boat, yes, with an odd shape and no lights except for the uneven   
flicker of oil lanterns. Every spooky story he'd heard over the past year came   
rushing back. Stories he had discounted at the time. Stories that were easy to   
discount while basking in the languid sun, but seemed a lot more plausible in the   
mysterious dark.   
"We go now," he declared, rushing to do just that.   
"What kind of a boat is that?" Scott wondered aloud. "Bri, do you   
know?"   
"It's a pirate ship!" his buddy laughed in boyish glee. "A _pirate_ ship!"   
Although the wind was barely more than a breeze, the ship bore steadily   
down on them. It was a schooner in miniature, maybe 1/3 scale of the ones that   
had once plied and plundered their way across this part of the sea.   
Scott, also laughing, grabbed the spotlight on the _Coral's_ rail and   
switched it on, training it on the approaching ship. The figurehead at the prow   
was of a woman-shape in regal garb. Letters were painted across the hull in a   
style to suggest woodburning edged in gold -- _Lady MacBeth_, it read.   
"Where's the crew?" Bri asked.   
Roderigo started the engine but it came on with a protesting cough and   
he knew instantly that they were not going to be able to outrun the other ship. He   
gave it his best try anyway, nearly throwing his customers overboard with the   
shuddering jolt as the _Coral_ leaped forward.   
The spotlight escaped Scott's hands and swung crazily across the sky. It   
caught and lit a dark, winged shape descending toward them, then the beam of   
light tilted down to illuminate nothing but the sea. Fish, mistaking it for the sun,   
swam up into the oblong glow.   
"Did you see --?" Bri bit off the rest, as if unable to believe he'd seen it   
himself.   
A butterfly of flame unfolded on the _Lady MacBeth_. No, not a butterfly,   
but wings of fire framing a robed body. The man, or angel, or whatever he was,   
lofted himself from the deck and drew a blazing sword as he glided near.   
Something heavy thudded on the roof of the _Coral's_ cabin. Roderigo,   
inside, heard it but couldn't see. He did see, though, the expression of utter terror   
on Bri's face.   
"You've been boarded!" a deep voice announced.   
The fiery one swung his sword, shattering the spotlight. Glass and   
charred metal rained hissing into the water. Scott screamed and backpedaled.   
"Huh?" Bri said. "Huh? What?"   
"Idiot human!" the voice thundered.   
Roderigo had a quick impression of feathery black wings, great and   
sweeping. A curve of silver whispered through the air. Then Bri was on the deck,   
his legs kicking as if he were swimming, his arms clutching spasmodically ... yes,   
Bri was on the deck ... in two places on the deck ... he'd been cut in half and in   
the moment before life fled him, his eyes met Roderigo's with hellish awareness.   
The shape standing over Bri turned to see what the dead man's last sight   
had been. Roderigo felt his mouth fall open, heard himself yammering a prayer   
he had learned at his grandmother's knee and thought he'd entirely forgotten.   
Death stood before him. Death, his skeletal form somehow seeming   
awesomely powerful, his hooded face monstrous. He held a scythe, its gleaming   
edge now dulled by blood, and his eyes were the white-blue of St. Elmo's fire.   
Without pausing for thought, Roderigo slammed through the small door   
and raced for the rail. He expected at any moment to see his legs run on ahead of   
him as his severed torso toppled like a felled tree, trying to prepare himself for   
the swift, awful invasion of that slicing blade.   
He saw without caring that the wrathful fire-angel and cornered Scott   
and was toying with him, feinting with his blazing sword as if Scott might have a   
chance of escape.   
Roderigo dove, and felt or imagined the billowing back of his shirt split   
by the tip of the scythe. Then he plunged into the cool, silken waters and started   
swimming for all he was worth. He'd been swimming since before he could walk,   
nobody could outdistance him in the water. He left his boat behind and never   
cared if he saw it, or his customers, again.   
A shape glided through the depths beneath him. He saw the sleek   
fishtail ... the bare breasts ... the long streaming green-gold hair ...   
A mermaid? But it couldn't be! His mind was playing tricks on him!   
Yet she came closer, propelling herself with fluid ease. A mermaid, the   
most beautiful thing he had ever seen! He gasped, forgetting that he was   
underwater. His lungs rebelled against the intrusive seawater. He kicked toward   
the surface ... then felt a three-fingered, webbed hand close around his ankle.   
As she drew him down, the last things he saw were the batlike wings   
folded tight against her sides, and the deep turquoise glow of her eyes. 

* * 

**Manhattan**   
**May, 2000**

"No offense, Uncle Brendan, but this is more boring than a seminar on   
investment planning."   
"So much for next weekend's outing."   
Her boisterous laugh at his deadpan reply turned many heads in her   
direction. Birdie Yale, center of attention yet again. Dressed, as usual, in   
typically eye-popping style: amethyst-colored tube dress belted with a silver   
chain, black tights, black jacket, low black boots with clunky soles.   
The New York Conference on History and Archaeology was in full   
swing. The hotel's meeting rooms were packed with seminars on everything from   
Incan pottery to Native American medicine to African folklore.   
"Should be Elisa here instead of me," Birdie remarked, studying the list.   
"She's experienced most of this stuff first-hand."   
"Uh-huh," Brendan said, rising on his toes to peer over the crowd in the   
large ballroom, which had been converted into a dealer's hall where a display of   
yellowed maps might be flanked on one side by Roman coins and on the other by   
reproductions of cave paintings.   
Most of the attendees were as dry, dusty, or mummified as the artifacts   
they studied. Elderly professors whose hands were permanently bleached with   
chalkdust. Aged adventurers whose strong chins and manly chests had softened   
over the years. Here and there, college students who hungered for a time when   
the world had been full of mystery and challenge, a simpler era when instead of   
clear-cutting the rain forest, brave men explored and found hidden temples,   
fabulous treasure.   
Yep, all that ... and her and Brendan. But Brendan even qualified in a   
half-assed sort of way; his grandfather had been an explorer and he himself had   
been on a thrills-and-chills vacation with Broadway and Elektra. So he fit in.   
Which left her.   
"Why'd you want to come, anyway?" Brendan sank back to his feet with   
a look of disappointment.   
"Fergs asked me to check it out," Birdie said. "She would have come   
herself, but a.) it's daytime and b.) she still hasn't gotten the knack of illusions on   
film. Her dad's birthday is coming up and she wants to find him some moldy   
oldie from the Middle Ages."   
"I certainly hope you're not talking about me," a voice said behind her.   
Birdie smiled and turned. She'd know those drop-dead-sexy inflections   
anyplace. "Heya, Prof!"   
"Good afternoon, Miss Yale, Mr. Vandermere."   
"Professor MacDuff," Brendan said, shaking his hand.   
"So what's this about moldy oldies?" he demanded with a teasing glint   
in his eye.   
"Oh, I wasn't talking about you," Birdie assured him. "If Fergs gave you   
to her _dad_ for a birthday present, I'd never speak to her again!"   
He gave her a look as if to ask 'and what is _that_ supposed to mean,' so   
she fired one right back that said 'what do you _think_ it means,' with a little   
extra smolder. Nothing like some nice safe flirting for a lost cause.   
"Are you speaking on any of the panels?" Brendan asked.   
"Tomorrow at three," MacBeth said. "The effects of gunpowder on   
warfare, downfall of the era of castles, that sort of thing. Yourself?"   
"Just ... looking around, mostly," Brendan said.   
Birdie smirked, knowing full well why he was here. "So, Prof, see   
anything you like?" Turn the smolder a little higher ...   
"A few exhibits have caught my eye," he said, either low and   
insinuating on purpose or she was reading too much into it ... no, she was   
definitely reading too much into it, wishful thinking, anybody? "But at the   
moment, I was on my way to lunch. Would either of you care to join me?"   
"We'd be delighted," Brendan said, and Birdie could have stepped on   
his foot, whaddaya mean _we_?   
The hotel pub was called Canterbury's, and they were between the noon   
and dinner rushes. The decor was heavy on the dark oak, going for the country-   
squire-fox-hunting motif. Maroon leather chairs with about a bazillion brass   
nubbies punched into the backs. Slightly schmaltzy faux-history that probably   
annoyed the living hell out of 80% of the conference guests.   
MacBeth took the booth side, while Birdie and Brendan sat opposite   
him in those leather-and-nubby chairs. The menus transcended shmaltz, with   
theme names taken from the Canterbury Tales. The Miller, the Wife of Bath ...   
decisions, decisions.   
"I can't believe they carded me!" Birdie groaned in chagrin as the   
waitress left with their order.   
"Compared to most of the people they've been seeing all day, you're just   
a baby," Brendan said.   
To change the subject, Birdie filled MacBeth in on the latest Aerie   
Building news. Things had been fairly quiet since Alex's accidental trip to a   
world that sounded suspiciously like one she'd read about in a novel two years   
ago. Goliath doted on baby Amber to the point that Angela was starting to get   
her feathers ruffled, not that she'd ever admit it, of course. Elisa had been getting   
threatening letters from some crackpot. Xanatos had been busy with Illuminati   
stuff, Owen's kids had spent some time in the castle. That was about it.   
"And you? Keeping busy? Out of trouble?"   
Brendan chuckled into his wineglass. "Half her friends call her Jail Bird   
now --"   
"Watch it," she warned her uncle. To MacBeth, she said, "Trouble?   
Me?"   
"Tell him about your audition," Brendan said.   
"Oh, God." She rolled her eyes.   
"Audition?" MacBeth prompted.   
"I wasn't even there to audition," Birdie said. "I was just tagging along   
as moral support for Jeff Morton, do you remember him? I didn't say a word!   
But the director took one look at me and said I was perfect."   
"You don't seem very pleased."   
"I'm an actress, dammit! I want to _act_! They cast me as _Rizzo_!"   
It took MacBeth a moment, but then he started to laugh, and Brendan   
joined him.   
"Yeah, yeah, very funny," Birdie grumbled.   
"I'm sorry, Birdie," Brendan said, "but I just couldn't see you as Sandy.   
Your friend Aiden, maybe ..."   
"Oh, now, that'd be something," MacBeth said. "A gargoyle version of   
Grease."   
"I could so do Sandy!" Birdie protested.   
"The final scene, maybe," Brendan allowed.   
"What, where she's a slut?" Birdie plucked the festooned toothpick   
from her sandwich, put it in her straw, and aimed it like a blowgun. "The 'tell me   
about it, stud,' scene? Is that what you meant, uncle dear? Think before you   
speak, now ..."   
"I'm sure you'll do splendidly, whatever the role," MacBeth said.   
"Thank you, professor," she said regally, putting down the straw. "It is   
nice to know that someone has confidence in me." She saw him grin, saw his   
struggle, and added, "Just leave it at that, okay? Whatever you were going to say   
about how they should do a movie based on Madonna's life or something, just let   
it go. Deal?"   
"Deal." They shook on it.   
It was Brendan's turn to change the subject, so he showed off his find   
from the dealer's hall, a fragment of an urn that showed the little-known Egyptian   
goddess Kal-Tet. That turned into a lively recounting of his trip there.   
"Is he embellishing?" MacBeth leaned over to ask Birdie in an   
undertone at one point.   
"I know it sounds like one of those cliffhanger shows, but according to   
Broadway and Elektra, that's really how it happened. Of course, they were   
sleeping for most of it ... "   
Brendan, oblivious, went on. Dakota this and Dakota that, until it   
passed endearing and went straight to annoying.   
And then, like timing from heaven, an announcement filtered in from   
the conference desk over the hotel sound system, that there had been a change in   
the schedule and the seminar on 3rd Dynasty Egypt would be taking place in   
fifteen minutes in the Ames Room, and due to a cancellation, Professor Henry   
Jones, Jr., would be joined by his granddaughter, esteemed Egyptologist --   
The fastest excuse-me-gotta-go-nice-seeing-you that Birdie had ever   
heard came rapid-fire out of Brendan's mouth. He nearly smacked her in the face   
throwing her his Gold Card to cover lunch, and was out the door so fast he   
nearly left flaming treads like a cartoon character.   
"I do believe your uncle is in love," MacBeth said once Brendan was   
out of earshot.   
"I guess she made a hell of an impression. It's about time, though. He   
and Aunt Margot were never really what I'd call romantic. Not sure exactly   
_what_ I'd call it, but it's over now so it doesn't matter. She's Castaway's cuddle-   
bunny now."   
"All of this must be very difficult for your family," he said.   
"Yeah, well, life's not a weenie roast," she said. "The weirdest part is   
that Chas and I both like Brendan a lot better now, but he's not really our uncle   
anymore. We get stuck with Aunt Margot as a blood relative. Ugh."   
MacBeth shook his head resignedly. "One cannot choose one's kin."   
"Good thing, too, or I'd be on my own!"   
"That would be a shame. No one should be alone." He peered into the   
depths of his glass somberly.   
"You're not getting depressed on me, are you?" Birdie chided. "Are you   
one of those mopey drunks?"   
"I'm hardly drunk, nor am I mopey. I was merely making an   
observation. Your uncle is most fortunate to have found someone to capture his   
heart. I wish them the best of luck. Love is a treasured thing; to live without it is   
to suffer."   
"And you say you're not mopey?"   
"Perhaps I am," he admitted. "Or envious."   
"What happened with that woman from the pirate place? Broadway told   
me he thought you two really hit it off." Lucky thing, lucky, lucky thing!   
He sighed. "Lynne ... a charming, elegant woman. My mistake was in   
being honest with her. I told her everything, right from the start so that there   
would be no surprises later. It was more than she could take. Not at first, but it   
grew on her. The knowledge that I had lived so long, done so much, would   
remain forever unchanged. That I was unlike everyone else. It disturbed her so   
that the only thing we could do was end our acquaintance. I'd dared to let myself   
hope again, and once again it came to nothing."   
"Maybe you're looking for the wrong things in a relationship," Birdie   
said.   
"And what do you mean by that?"   
"Well ... what _are_ you looking for? You seem too hung up on this   
lifespan thing. Why not just enjoy what you've got while you have it?"   
"I do not like dishonesty in matters of intimacy. How could I love a   
woman while keeping such a truth from her? Yet the knowing of that truth erects   
a wall of difference."   
Birdie mulled it over. "One -- you could find someone who doesn't care   
about that. So you're immortal? So what?"   
"So what?!?" he echoed, clearly appalled. "So what? I have lived for a   
thousand years! I have seen and experienced things no one alive today will ever   
know outside of a history book!"   
"Yeah ... your point?"   
"It has a tendency to upset people when they learn that."   
"Exactly, so you find someone who doesn't freak out."   
"Mmm-hmm," he said, unconvinced. "And your second choice?"   
"Just get laid."   
He'd made the error of lifting his glass and very nearly sprayed a   
shocked mouthful of beer. "What?!"   
"Quit being all long-term about it and just get laid. You get so wrapped   
up in thinking that she'll get old and die while you remain how you are, so you're   
already doing the grief and loss thing before you've even gotten started. Forget   
about what'll happen in fifty or twenty years. Carpe diem, for crying out loud!"   
"I don't think of myself as the sort of man who would indulge in a   
casual affair," he said, drawing himself up proudly.   
"Didn't you ever, in all those centuries, tumble a wench or something?"   
"That's hardly the same."   
"Bull puckey."   
"Not to mention greatly frowned upon in this day and age. Wenches are   
no more. Respectable women expect, with good right and reason, something   
more than a single night, and whores are illegal."   
She laughed again. "So find someone in between!"   
"Your counsel is thought-worthy --"   
"Oh, stop, that's the same tone of voice you used in the classroom when   
you thought your students were so full of crap they squeaked."   
"This is why you never made the Sterling Academy Debate Team," he   
said.   
"I was robbed; I would have been great at it!"   
"I witnessed the tryouts. You flipped off the opposition. With both   
hands. And a raspberry."   
"I was trying to make a point."   
"You certainly did. Two alumni fainted and your friend Aiden very   
nearly joined them."   
She tossed her head, the burgundy blaze at the front of her mass of   
black curls bouncing across her line of sight. "It could have been worse."   
"I'm well aware of that."   
What she was going to say next was drowned out as two college-age   
guys passed behind her, half-drunk and pretending to spar. One of them tripped   
on the leg of her chair, blundered into his friend, and they came to a discordant   
clumsy halt.   
"Hey!" the one who had tripped shouted. "How about moving your fat   
ass out of the aisle?"   
MacBeth had him by the shirtfront before the punk even realized the   
older man had gotten up. "That's no way to speak to a lady."   
"Come on, lay off!" protested the punk's pal apologetically, a little less   
drunk and with keener animal instincts that let him see MacBeth not as a grey-   
haired old fart but as a powerfully-built warrior of excellent reflexes.   
"Don't break him, okay?" Birdie said nonchalantly. "He's too 'faced to   
walk straight."   
"I'd be fine if your fat ass wasn't blocking the aisle!" the punk, Mr. One-   
Track Insult, spat. He threw in, "Bitch!" for good measure   
Birdie then started as if she realized he was speaking to her, and   
whirled around with an innocent look. An innocent look, hand curled over her   
mouth in a pose of astonishment, and one elbow raised so that the pointy wedge   
of bone whammed squarely into the fly of the punk's jeans.   
"Oh, was I in your way?" she inquired all breathy and wide-eyed.   
"Hhhoargh!" the punk groaned.   
"Maybe I'd better just sit someplace else," Birdie continued, pushing   
hard away from the table. The back of the chair collided smartly with his already   
abused groin.   
MacBeth released him, and the man duck-walked backward with his   
hands cupped.   
His friend grabbed him by the shoulders while those around them   
snickered. "Come on, Randy. Let's get out of here."   
"Uuuurgh," Randy agreed.   
Birdie abandoned her chair and slid into the booth. "That was very   
gallant," she said.   
"They had no right to treat you in that manner."   
"Well ... I _do_ have a fat ass," she said, shrugging. "It's not like he was   
totally out of line."   
"Nonsense," he said sharply. "You have a lovely figure. You forget, it's   
only within the past century that women such as that --" here he jerked his head   
toward a pair of model-types lounging artfully by the bar, "-- have come to be   
considered attractive. Throughout most of history, beauty such as yours was the   
ideal."   
"You shouldn't tell me things like that."   
"Why not?"   
"Because," she said, sliding around the curve of the table to sit closer to   
him, "it might make me think I have a chance."   
He chuckled. "I'm afraid you're much too young for me."   
"Who isn't?"   
That one caught him without a ready reply, as she thought it might.   
"I already know your secret," she added. "Doesn't bother me at all. My   
best friend is a spell-chucking gargoyle, remember, and my roommate is part   
faerie."   
Still speechless, he only stared at her.   
"And maybe there is a wench or two left in the world," she concluded   
with a wink.   
"I'm beginning to think you've seduction in mind."   
"What gave me away?"   
"Your hand on my thigh, for one."   
She looked down in apparent surprise. "Oh, mercy, how _did_ that get   
there?" She retrieved it, spanked it briskly with the fingers of her other hand.   
"Bad Birdie! Bad!"   
"I'm relieved to see you have some sense of propriety."   
"No, I meant to put it higher."   
"Did you," he said evenly.   
"Shall I demonstrate?" She knew the devil-may-care look was dancing   
in her brown eyes, making him wonder and worry that she would do it, would do   
that and more, right here in this dimly-lit little bar with sixty or more people in   
close quarters.   
"Not here." He spoke with decisiveness, rising and pulling on his long   
black coat.   
Astonished, it was her turn to stare. "What?"   
"Not here." He pulled her to her feet.   
"Are you serious?" Her mind was whirling. Did he think he was calling   
a bluff? Or did he really mean it?   
"Aren't you?" He fixed her with a steely gaze that said he didn't   
appreciated teasing wenchly games, that in his view, a man or a woman should   
say what they mean and stick to it.   
"Yeah, but I never thought ..." she shook her head smartly, took a deep   
gasp, and recovered. "Well. Let's go." 

* * 

**Veradoga Island**   
**May 2000**

"More of this useless parchment," Reaper said scornfully, flinging a   
wad of money into the barrel. "What a world we've awakened in!"   
Melusine poked through the glittering pile of jewelry. "Even their gold   
is thinned with base metals, and many of these gems are imitation."   
"But spices!" Brand said, holding up one container after another.   
"Pepper, cinnamon, ginger, so plentiful!"   
"I like the toys," Imp piped up. One of their most recent victories had   
been against a houseboat, which had yielded the chest of fanciful childrens'   
playthings.   
Reaper looked down fondly at his son. It was lonely for Imp with no   
other hatchlings, but the playthings delighted him and kept him busy. Chimera   
was as always a dutiful caretaker, better than many other gargoyle beasts Reaper   
had known because Chimera's three heads let him keep an eye on every possible   
avenue of mischief.   
"Yes, the food is much better in this time," Melusine agreed. "No more   
hardtack, or salt pork. These humans live as kings at table."   
"Food will feed our clan, but what of gold?" Reaper said. "As we once   
took sails, we now take fuel drums ... but what of bolts of silk, kegs of rum,   
slaves, cotton, tobacco?"   
"What would we do with them?" Brand asked. "Where would we sell   
such plunder? The world has changed, Reaper. The pirate havens of old are long   
gone."   
"Those we meet see us even more as monsters now than ever,"   
Melusine said.   
"Aye, that fear and their weakness mean that with only three warriors,   
we can seize entire ships, but for what?" Reaper picked up a gun. "Even the   
weapons we seize are small and feeble! I cannot fit my smallest claw to pull the   
trigger. We've not seen a cutlass or a saber all this year! That place we awakened   
was a stage for playacting nonsense; the weapons aboard our ship were as much   
for false show as the ship herself!"   
"What else are we to do?" Melusine asked. "This is our purpose, what   
we know, all we have. We've a ship, we've each other, we've the wide seas to call   
our own. Better this, even if the gold is thinned and the weapons are strange,   
than to be frozen again in wood. Better this than to join with those other   
gargoyles we saw, the fat one and the frail one who were allies with our old foe."   
"She was not so frail," Brand murmured with a lecherous smile.   
"Can't we find pirate men?" Imp asked, clinging to Reaper's leg and   
peering up at him with large wistful eyes. "Like before?"   
"I will not ally with humans again," Reaper declared. "The rest of our   
clan paid the ultimate price."   
"Captain Tate would not have willingly let us come to harm," Melusine   
said. "You know he was in Vera Cruz when it happened."   
"His place was on his ship, not in his mistress' bed," Brand said. "For   
all we know, he could have had foreknowledge of the attack and let us go to our   
deaths."   
"We'll never know; he and all his crew are fish-food long since."   
Reaper sighed. "No, we cannot trust the humans. We cannot trust other   
gargoyles. We have only ourselves."   
Melusine rose, balancing on her tail, and undulated to him. "At least   
that, my love. At least that."   
He gazed into her turquoise eyes. "I promised you a ship of gold, my   
angel of the deep. This cavern is not much of a dream come true."   
"It is home," she told him, opening her arms to include the cavern with   
its clutter of furnishings gleaned from plundered pleasure boats. At one end, an   
opening was veiled by the moonlit sparkle of the waterfall that cascaded from the   
height of Veradoga Point. At the back of the cave was a steeply sloped tunnel   
that wound down to the concealed seacave where the Lady MacBeth was   
moored. "Where the five of us can be together, it is home."   
"Yes." He embraced her, but even her warmth and the glory of her hair   
could not entirely turn his thoughts from the time that had been, when their clan   
was strong and the Wyvern ruled the seas ... 

* * 

**Belize, on the Gulf of Honduras**   
**July, 1698**

The sun slipped below the horizon, and the pirate galleon _Wyvern_ was   
filled with the sound of splintering wood. An observer might have first thought   
that the ship itself was coming apart under some unimaginable stress, until that   
observer chanced to look upon the dozens of wooden figures that lined her sides.   
Wood split, falling away in scrap and sawdust, revealing living bodies   
beneath. The figures stretched and moved, their eyes coming alight in white-blue   
or blazing turquoise. Wings began unfolding, wings like those of angels or   
dragons, bats or birds of prey.   
Reaper roared as he cast off his wooden skin and welcomed the rush of   
the sea air through his dusky black feathers, over his dark-and-pale patterned   
skin that gave him the appearance of a skeletal nightmare. Gripping his scythe,   
he dove from the prow and swooped in a soaring arc to join the rest of his clan as   
they glided around the masts and sails.   
As always, their first matter of business was to scan the horizons for   
enemy ships. Nary a one this night, neither plump barque laden with sugar and   
rum nor hunter's vessel bent on scouring the seas clean of pirates.   
The newest additions to the crew stared upward in awe and dread as the   
gargoyles descended to the deck. A few began babbling prayers but were quickly   
silenced by clouts from more senior crewmen.   
"They're na demons, ye squealing, squalling nancies!" Sharkey scolded.   
"Na the wrath o' God come ta punish ye for yar sins, less'n thar be a man among   
ye what's been given over to buggery!" He laughed and pointed at Reaper's   
scythe. "If so, thar's the answer for ye!"   
Reaper turned toward the old sailor. "What news?"   
Sharkey spat over the rail. "Gah. Yon fool --" he jerked a thumb in the   
direction of the captain's cabin, "-- be bent on plotting a course for the Red Sea."   
"Why?" Brand demanded. Reaper's rookery brother was fiery by both   
appearance and nature, the brightness of his wings dictating the intensity of his   
mood, and now they flickered red and gold. "Why sail so far when there's wealth   
aplenty to be had here?"   
"The talk of John Avery's what's done it," Sharkey explained. "Every   
man-jack worth his powder's heard tell o' his prize. The Great Mogul's daughter   
to ransom? Shares of a thousand pound? Aye, who'd not be thinking o' trying his   
luck against the pilgrim fleets? Including our own captain. The English and   
Spanish have gone and put a scare into him, that they have. He's thinking the Red   
Sea sounds much more to his liking."   
"Aye, 'tis gone bad, here," the first mate said, overhearing. "Port   
Royal's gone, sunk into the sea, and we'd all do well to set sail for the heathen   
lands. It's raiding the Christians what's done it. Talk o' God's wrath, Sharkey,   
look on Port Royal!"   
"Our clan has sailed these islands for two centuries!" Reaper said. "We   
know every beach, every cove, every sandbar! Why should we abandon our   
home?"   
"Ye'll go whar the cap'n sails ya." Fat Jim's gap-toothed grin was   
anything but friendly. "Ye're no better'n a mast or a cannon. Whar the _Wyvern_   
goes, so go ye."   
Reaper turned slowly to the round-bellied carpenter. "No better than a   
mast or cannon?"   
"Here, now!" Sharkey interposed himself between them. "Jim, ye'd do   
well to mind yer manners. Carpenter ye may be, but na worth yer weight in   
doubloons."   
"That'd be a pile of doubloons indeed," Scylla, one of Reaper's rookery   
sisters, muttered snidely.   
"I will speak to the captain," Reaper decided.   
"Yes, tell him we cannot make such a long and dangerous journey   
now!" Melusine said. "My sisters and I plan a breeding season soon!"   
"Thar's all we need," Fat Jim said. "The best hold taken up with yer   
mess o' straw and eggs."   
"I've told ye once, Jim!" Sharkey said. "Again and I'll take a belaying   
pin to ye, so help me!"   
Scowling, the carpenter hauled himself upright and began lurching   
away on the wooden foot that replaced the one he'd lost off Nassau.   
"I don't trust that man," Brand said. "I don't trust him not to come at us   
with his carving tools one day."   
"Captain Santiago would never allow it," Melusine said. "He is a good   
man."   
"A good man, but a frightened man," Scylla said. "British warships   
everywhere like ticks on a dog, not to mention the Spaniards! Is it any wonder   
Santiago's thinking of far seas?"   
"I will speak to him," Reaper said again, and strode purposefully to the   
door of the captain's cabin. He knocked and opened it without waiting for a   
response.   
Within, Enrique Santiago was bent over his table, where maps of the   
Indian Ocean were held in place with brass clamps. As befitted his alleged status   
as an exiled Spanish nobleman, he wore a crimson damask coat and a ruffled   
shirt, and his black hair was pulled back in neat waves to be caught in a ponytail   
with a red ribbon.   
"How sounds Zanzibar, Reaper?" he asked without looking up. "Or   
does Mogadishu better strike your fancy?"   
"Portobello," Reaper countered. "Or Cartagena."   
A grimace crossed Santiago's face. "The Caribbean is not as welcoming   
as once she was."   
"When have we ever been welcome? When has the black flag ever been   
greeted with joy?"   
"There are better prizes to be had --"   
"You've lost your spine. You flee like a coward at the first sign of   
danger. All it's taken is one whisper of that Scotsman --"   
"Better a lost spine than a lost head," Santiago said sharply. "And you   
should heed those whispers, my friend, because they tell me that the Scottish   
Rogue, as they call him on Hispaniola, knows your kind and has no love for   
them."   
"Show me a man who does." Reaper crossed his arms and looked down   
on Santiago -- no mean feat, for the Spaniard towered above most men and many   
gargoyles. "My clan will not forsake their home for fear of some would-be pirate   
hunter."   
Santiago pinched the bridge of his nose as if his head pained him. "This   
Moray is no normal man, from what I've heard."   
"I suppose they say he can catch musket balls in his teeth and spit them   
back with the force of a cannon," Reaper said with contempt. "My clan do not   
wish to leave."   
"Who captains this ship?" Santiago, out of patience, snapped.   
"Whoever the crew chooses," Reaper replied. "You know as well as I   
that they choose a man both bold and ruthless. If you'd keep your crew and your   
ship, then you'd do well to keep that in mind. It's been weeks since we've taken a   
ship, months since we've sacked a town. You can't think these men will follow   
you all the way to the Indian Ocean with no victory to feed the fire in their   
blood!"   
"I will not linger here to be slaughtered! I have a wife and son in   
Tortuga to think of!"   
"Then take another ship! Leave the Wyvern --"   
"To you?"   
"To another captain, whoever that may be. I have seen six captains   
come and go, and the leader before me knew close to twenty. You humans come   
and go. Only our clan remains constant."   
Santiago crossed to the porthole and stood staring out at the moonlit   
verdant hills that rose above Belize. Reaper fell silent and let him think.   
"Very well," Santiago finally said. "We'll find a good prize ship, seize   
her, and those of the crew who wish to stay behind may do so with my blessing.   
We'll divide our plunder and go our separate ways."   
Reaper inclined his cowled head, grimly satisfied, and went back on   
deck to give his clan the news. 

* * 

**Excerpt from a letter to Albert Barker**   
**From his brother Henry, a passenger aboard the _Marie Jeanette_**   
**August 14th, 1698**

The crew did not seem to expect an attack by night, but they chose the   
brave and foolish course of rallying to fight back. I was wakened by the shouting   
and came onto the deck to see the pirate vessel _Wyvern_ bearing down on us.   
There were gargoyles flying vanguard, and a more ferocious and   
horrible sight I thought never to see -- this was yet before I witnessed the   
atrocities committed upon the crew for the crime of their resistance.   
It is said that pirates do these hideous deeds to create a terrifying image,   
and from what I saw that hellish night, it is an image well-deserved. To those   
who surrender without a fight, more leniency is accorded, or so I have heard,   
because the pirates wish quick victories.   
The crewmen, and I fault them not for this, concentrated their fire upon   
the gargoyles in their raw panic. But the demonic things avoided and evaded   
with what seemed to me scornful ease, and in the meanwhile, the Wyvern drew   
close and allowed the pirates to swarm aboard our decks.   
That show of defiance had doomed the crew. The pirates fell upon   
them, and soon the air was filled with the stink of black powder, smoke, and   
blood. Those who resisted were given brutal beatings, then hacked with cutlasses   
and thrown, many yet conscious and screaming, into the sea.   
I thank God my dear Margaret had not accompanied me, for the   
indecent molestations accorded to the wife of one Andrews are too horrid to   
relate, and Andrews himself in trying to defend her was punished by having the   
heart cut from his breast, soaked in spirits (of which I believe rum was chief   
among them), and then devoured by a many-headed serpentine monster which   
accompanied the gargoyles.   
Our captain, wounded but unbowed even in the face of all these terrible   
acts, refused to divulge the whereabouts and nature of the ship's cargo and   
treasures. For this, he was subjected to a torture I was later to learn is called   
'woolding,' in which a length of cord was wrapped about his head and twisted   
until the eyes burst from his skull.   
Six other passengers and I were spared any harm, once we had turned   
over all that we had of value. Of the crew, the surgeon's mate and the carpenter   
were forced to sign Articles agreeing to join the pirates, three others willingly   
petitioned to join, and the rest were killed with cutlasses and knives the better to   
save gunpowder.   
The pirates then seized control of the _Marie Jeanette_, and spent two   
days ransacking the ship from end to end. The fate of myself and my fellow   
survivors was not yet determined, but as the pirates grew more drunken and   
high-spirited, taking to wasting the gunpowder they had only two days ago   
sought to save by firing on gulls and other seabirds, we began to fear for our   
lives ... 

* * 

**Manhattan**   
**May, 2000**

"Oh! Oh, now! Now!" Birdie tugged on MacBeth's hair, gently at first,   
then with more insistence as he did not quit but kept on with what he was doing.   
"Now! Oh! I can't stand it!"   
At that, he did raise his head, but only long enough to look at her with a   
bemused smile. "Young people today have no patience. Is nothing worth waiting   
for?"   
"I'm going _crazy_!" she informed him.   
He slowly ran his tongue along the inside of her thigh, his beard   
brushing like soft plush against her skin. Then he slid both hands beneath her   
buttocks and lifted her hips, resuming his diligent efforts, until Birdie really   
_did_ think she was going to lose her mind.   
Most of the other guys she'd been with seemed to take increased   
excitement as a cue to fixate harder-and-faster attention, not realizing that too   
much direct stimulation quickly sent many women right over the narrow line   
dividing extreme pleasure from extreme discomfort. MacBeth knew better. Oh,   
did he ever know better!   
Several minutes later, when she could move her legs again and the   
tremors had dwindled to occasional little twitches, she rolled onto her side and   
looked at him. He'd moved up to rest beside her as she recovered, and only the   
stiffness prodding her hip betrayed his own state.   
Now she reached down and caressed him. He was uncircumcised, which   
shouldn't have surprised her but did, leaving her feeling silly for being surprised   
in the first place -- of _course_ he wasn't; they didn't _do_ that in early 11th-   
century Scotland ...   
Besides, she'd discovered that although it looked different flaccid (not   
that she'd seen it that way for very long, a fact of which she was quite proud), it   
sure didn't seem to matter once it was a fine upstanding citizen.   
And, really, given _whose_ it was, she probably wouldn't have cared if   
it was painted purple or shaped like a curlicue ... well, she would have _cared_   
but it still wouldn't have mattered all that much. This was MacBeth, MacBeth   
naked, naked and in bed with her; to hell with everything else!   
Luckily, though, it _wasn't_ purple (a tad rosy at the tip, was all) and   
not at all curlicued, just the right length and thickness. If there had been a   
contest, the blue ribbon would have been all his.   
That reminded her of a bawdy song, and _that_ made her laugh.   
Generally, laughing while gripping a man's erection is an automatic trip   
to Shrivel-Town, but that applied only to insecure guys and not to supremely   
confident immortal kings. He just hoisted an eyebrow at her and invited her to   
share the joke.   
"There's a song, I can't remember how it goes, called The Sleeping   
Scotsman," she said. "This Scotsman is going home drunk and passes out under   
a tree, and two girls walk by ... I do remember that part. See yon sleeping   
Scotsman, so fair and handsome built, I wonder if it's true what they don't wear   
beneath their kilt. So they hike his kilt for a look, then tie a ribbon around it as a   
joke. The Scotsman wakes up later, has to pee, so ..."   
MacBeth sang the rest. "He marveled for a moment at the sight before   
his eyes, and said, Lad, I don't know where ye've been --"   
Birdie joined in, "But I see ye've won first prize!"   
"I'm flattered," he said when they were done laughing together.   
"Though I don't wear a kilt."   
"That's okay; I like what you're wearing now."   
"I can think of something I'd like to try on."   
"I'm sure it'll fit."   
"Shall we find out?"   
Later, _much_ later, Birdie was fairly sure she wouldn't be able to stand   
steadily for an hour or more, and would probably have a smile on her face for   
the rest of the year at least.   
She curled against him with her head resting on his chest, crisp grey   
hair tickling her cheek, the rhythm of his heartbeat beneath her ear. She couldn't   
get over how at ease with each other they were, but knew that to talk about it   
would be to ruin it, so she just basked in the utter companionable comfort.   
"Older men," she eventually murmured.   
"Hmm?" MacBeth replied from what sounded like the threshold of   
sleep -- usually, she found that annoying as all hell, that men were poof! out of   
energy and ready for naptime right after, but hey, he had _earned_ it!   
"Older men," she said a little bit louder. "Guys my age don't know what   
they're doing."   
"Is that so?" Amused now. "Well, as we noted before, you won't find   
many as old as me."   
"Does that mean you're the best ever?"   
He gave her bottom a friendly squeeze. "I would never come right out   
and say such a thing."   
"Oooh, and he's _modest_, too!" she teased.   
"So then, what is the problem with men your age?"   
She blew through her teeth, making a _pffff_ sound. "Seems like they   
think they can learn everything they need to know from a porno movie. I can't   
speak for every woman in the world, but I for one know that there are some parts   
of my body I don't want yanked on, jackhammered into, or eja --" she bit off   
what she was about to say; too crude. "And I sure as hell wouldn't want to be   
trying to balance on a barstool with my legs in the air."   
"A spinal injury waiting to happen," he agreed.   
"Though probably a damn good abs workout," she said.   
"I assure you, even before such movies were commonplace, many men   
held very foolish ideas about what a woman liked. Those men that even gave a   
damn, that is."   
"Right, our male-dominated history; a man's pleasure is in the act, a   
woman's is in raising the resulting kiddies. A real lady wouldn't be allowed to   
enjoy herself, would she?"   
"Hence the wenches," he said with a grin. "Wenches were free to enjoy   
a good tumble."   
"And we're back to wenches. So, do I qualify?"   
"You would have made a fine wench."   
"Have you known many?"   
He chuckled. A bit self-consciously, she thought.   
"Aw, come on, do you think I'm easily shocked?" she wheedled. "I   
heard you used to be a pirate, so there must have been wenches aplenty --"   
"I was a pirate _hunter_," he interrupted to stress.   
"How'd you become a pirate hunter, anyway?"   
"Well, first," he admitted, "I _was_ a pirate ... "   
"Every woman's fantasy," she grinned.   
"Oh, no," he said seriously. "It was not like that at all. The romantic   
ideal of the swashbuckling rogue was fictionalized even in those days, but the   
truth was ruthless, brutal, and vicious."   
He was wide awake now, arms behind his head as he gazed up at the   
ceiling and the sheet bunched just above his waist. The posture put his well-   
defined pecs on gorgeous display, but Birdie kept her hands to herself (for the   
time being, at any rate). His eyes had taken on a faraway look, remembering   
those wild events of three centuries past.   
"I left London in the early 1600's," he said. "Following the death of   
Elizabeth, England lost much of its charm for me. She was a great lady, and   
although we'd had our differences, I, like many of her courtiers, loved her well.   
But there were beginning to be a few too many questions about Lord Moray,   
who'd come to Elizabeth's court thirty years earlier. So, I began a period of travel   
that would take me first to France --"   
"Musketeer France?" Birdie interjected.   
He nodded. "An era also greatly glamorized today. Eventually, I set sail   
for the colonies. I lived many years in Charleston before deciding to return to   
Europe. A few weeks out of port, our ship was attacked and all able-bodied men   
were given the choice to sign the Articles or be tortured for the amusement of the   
crew."   
"Nice."   
"Oh, very. That particular lot was made up of some of the most   
inventively cruel people it has ever been my misfortune to meet, and that is   
coming from a man who spent centuries in pursuit of Demona."   
"So you joined up ... sure, it's not like they could kill you, but pain still   
hurts, right?"   
"Right. And given that pirates are superstitious by nature, had they   
noticed the rate at which my wounds mended themselves, they might have   
decided I was some unnatural creature. I didn't relish the idea of being burned   
alive in an attempt to sear the devils from my flesh. So I signed their Articles,   
joined their crew. And to my surprise, I found that many aspects of that life   
suited me."   
"Travel, adventure, nobody staying around long enough to start   
wondering why you weren't getting any older ..."   
"In time, I got a ship of my own, a letter of marque from Louis XIV,   
and a good stout-hearted crew. Now they call it the Golden Age of piracy, and I   
suppose it was. We were with Henry Morgan at the sack of Panama in 1671, but   
my greatest prize and my greatest folly would come several years later ..." 

* * 

**Off the Spanish Main**   
**November, 1688**

"The vows men make when drunk," the man going by the name Lennox   
Moray said, shaking his head ruefully.   
"It were a grand funeral," Tag said. "Every ship's gun in Port Royal   
harbor all firing in salute. His wife wept, I heard."   
"You speak fondly of him for a lad who was a babe in arms when   
Panama was burning to the ground," Moray said.   
"I'm eighteen now, hardly a lad," Tag pointed out. "And what was   
Panama to me? You raised me. No town is my home, but the wide and rolling   
sea!"   
"Aye."   
What good would it do to tell the youth how it had been in those final   
violent days? The assault on Panama had been a lengthy and grueling process   
indeed, from the costly battle at San Lorenzo to the overland trek through the   
jungle to the disappointing and deadly findings in Panama itself.   
They'd overrun Don Juan Perez de Guzman's army, leaving better than   
five hundred men dead or dying at a cost of only fifteen of their own, but the   
determined Don Juan had made sure the pirates would have little to show for   
their victory. The city's wealth had been loaded onto ships and spirited away, the   
houses rigged with barrels of gunpowder.   
Moray closed his eyes briefly, still seeing the grisly aftermath although   
more than seventeen years had passed. The furious buccaneers, running from   
house to house searching for gold, while the city burned around them. They'd   
even raided the outlying villages and islands, savagely torturing the inhabitants   
to get them to reveal where they had hidden their money.   
Tag's mother had been one of those unlucky villagers. When beating   
failed to gain her cooperation (in the eyes of her attackers, anyway; they would   
later find that she could not tell them where any gold was for she had none), they   
threatened to slaughter her infant son before her very eyes.   
Unable to stand a drop more of bloodshed, Moray had intervened. The   
woman died from the extent of her injuries, and with her dying breath had   
exhorted him to look after her son.   
Now Tag was grown tall and strong, and on occasion reminded Moray   
forcibly of his own son, although there was no resemblance between them. Tag   
was dark, quick as a whip, and given to poetic flights of fancy, quite unlike the   
level-headed Luach.   
"It is the end of an era," Moray said. "Morgan's death will bring many   
changes."   
"Seems a strange way to honor his memory," Tag said. "Didn't he spend   
the past half-score years _hunting_ pirates? Yet here we are, lying in wait for a   
likely fat merchantman."   
"That's what I meant -- the vows men make when drunk. To recapture   
Morgan's glory days and sack some Spanish silver."   
"Aye, and give it all over to the French, like as not," Bosun Guthrie,   
lounging indolently by the helm, said sourly.   
"The men will have their shares," Moray told him.   
"Shares or no, ye're treating them like they signed on with the Royal   
Navy. Rules and drills ... why, there's some what say ye'll be having us in   
uniform before much longer."   
"It has been my experience that the better disciplined a crew, the more   
profitable their endeavors."   
Guthrie's expression suggested that he'd heard this particular line of   
reasoning many a time before, and was less impressed with it upon each   
repetition. But he chose to say nothing, settling for fishing out his tobacco   
pouch.   
Three days later, a sail was sighted. The _Saunders_, a barque leaving   
Puerto Cabello. She was riding low, her hold likely brimming with provisions   
and silver.   
Under the pretense of hailing for news, Moray had the _Fleance_ close to   
a short distance before hoisting the black flag.   
Surrender at once, that flag proclaimed.   
Immediately, the captain of the _Saunders_ tried to bring his ship around   
and flee.   
Now that the chase was underway, Moray's growing doubts fell away   
from him and he barked orders sharply. His men swarmed to obey -- when   
plunder was at hand, they didn't complain about discipline; it was only during   
those long becalmed days when the air hung still and humid that laziness spurred   
resentment.   
The black flag came down and the red was raised. The _Saunders_ had   
had her chance at peaceable surrender and declined.   
Riding low, yes, of course she was riding low! The _Saunders_ swung   
about and revealed a design of shipbuilding Moray had never seen before, three   
ranks of cannon ports, so that the entire side of the ship was pocked with black   
holes.   
He barely had time to shout a warning before the cannons roared. The   
angle was off, so many of the balls splashed into the deep, but several others tore   
through the planking of the _Fleance_. Men cartwheeled overboard from the   
impacts.   
"She'll send us straight to the bottom!" Guthrie shouted.   
"Fire a broadside!" Moray yelled.   
The_ Fleance's_ return fire was a pitiful spitting compared to the   
thunderous voice of the _Saunders_. Men on both ships raced to reload, but the   
Saunders was turning, turning to bring her other side and other ranks of cannons   
into play.   
"Ram her before she can come about!"   
"Ye madman!" Guthrie opined. "'Tis suicide!"   
Moray clouted him on the shoulder. "Just do as I say!"   
The _Fleance_, even damaged, was the more maneuverable of the vessels,   
and responded deftly. Wood shrieked as the hulls collided and scraped. More   
men were thrown in all directions. Moray saw one unlucky crewman fall with his   
legs tangled in a line, dropping into the crevasse as the ships rebounded apart,   
then slammed back together.   
Ropes flew, grappling onto the _Saunders_ to secure them together.   
Moray led the charge across the pitching deck, Tag at his side and his crew   
behind him, bristling with weapons and bloodthirsty cries.   
The men of the _Saunders_ met them, fighting ably and determinedly.   
They knew that, having resisted, they were sure to meet an ugly fate, and thus   
planned to take as many of their foes with them as possible. But Moray's drills   
paid off; his crew worked in concert without even seeming to be aware of it. Tag   
comported himself admirably, taking a shot in the shoulder but still managing to   
disarm the _Saunders_' first mate and then best him in a short but brutal knife fight.   
The battle raged back and forth for nearly an hour, but then the favor   
slowly turned in favor of the crew of the _Fleance_.   
"Blow her!" the captain of the _Saunders_ bellowed when it came clear all   
was lost. He was clearly an expert swordsman, holding off three of the pirates   
while contending with a keg tucked beneath his left arm.   
Those of his crew that were still able paled at that order, and many left   
off fighting to scramble to the longboats, or to the rails to leap overboard. Many   
of the _Fleance's_ crew caught their fear like the pox and followed, for it was   
suddenly clear to all of them that the ship was packed with gunpowder.   
Moray spied two men headed for the hatch, terrified-looking black   
slaves who dreaded their captain's wrath more than the certain death that awaited   
them.   
In the best tradition, he grabbed a line and swung. His fold-top boots   
struck one man in the midsection, knocking him over the rail. The expression on   
his face was almost one of gratitude.   
Then Moray let go and tackling the other. They rolled-bounced-crashed   
through the hatch together, fetching up against a lashed triangular stack of   
barrels. The flaming taper the man had been carrying flew from his hand,   
guttered as it struck the wall, then gusted to new life when it landed in a heap of   
wood shavings. Tongues of yellow flame licked hungrily at the curling wood,   
leaping as they tasted the draft from the open hatch.   
Moray was none too eager to survive an explosion at such close range.   
He seized the man, pummeled him senseless, and hurled him onto the flames,   
hoping to smother them beneath the body.   
It worked, or almost did. A sole ember, coughing out from beneath the   
man, alit on a spill of powder and grew too quickly to be extinguished. With bare   
seconds left, Moray scooped up the unconscious man and carried him back on   
deck, hurling him over the side into a crowded, bobbing longboat.   
"Here!" Tag beckoned, waving frantically.   
He returned the wave, looking about for the _Saunders_' captain, and   
spied him. The keg had become fouled in a tangle of cut lines and a torn sail, and   
the man was disregarding his own safety to struggle with it.   
Moray raced across the deck, fancying he could feel the gathering   
rumble of the explosion readying beneath his feet.   
"No, you shan't!" the captain yelled, brandishing his sword. "'Tis mine!"   
The gleaming steel swept toward him, biting through the sleeve of his   
black frock coat and into the meat of his left arm just below the shoulder. Moray   
drew his own sword, and attacked. He would just as soon leave the man to die in   
the dragon's breath of the explosion, but he wanted that keg, for whatever was in   
there was evidently worth the lives of a hundred men, and after all of this, he   
meant to have it.   
A cloud of swirling embers and heated air belched from the hatch,   
setting the tattered sails afire. A single loud report, like the world's largest   
cannon, shook the _Saunders_. Both captains staggered across the heaving deck.   
Moray's back slammed painfully into the rail, and then his enemy's hand was at   
his throat, forcing his head backward, clenching on his windpipe.   
They wrestled and struggled, neither able to bring their swords into   
play. Then the _Saunders_ captain hooked his fingers into Moray's sash and   
heaved, flipping him over.   
Moray caught the rail, his legs smashing into a cannon port. He had   
time to think that a few inches lower and he would have never needed wonder   
again if the Weird Sisters' spell had somehow left him infertile, for it would have   
been a moot point.   
Rather than lean down to finish him off, the other captain turned and   
went back for his keg. Swearing in a hodgepodge of languages, Moray hauled   
himself back up and limped after.   
"Mine!" the captain, unaware of Moray coming up behind him, shrieked   
in triumph as he freed the keg from its entanglement.   
Just then, the powder blew. The rear of the ship seemed to lift   
completely out of the water, and in the eerie silence following the deafening   
boom, Moray imagined he heard seawater dripping from its raised hull.   
A fist of fire drove both captains into the air, their coats ablaze. They   
went into the churning froth, with debris raining down all around them.   
Moray came up, gasping, and saw his foe only a few yards away. Hair   
burnt away, skin crisped to char in places, the man was still clinging to the keg.   
His eyes turned toward Moray, huge and dark, but then Moray saw they weren't   
eyes at all but only sockets from which the soft tissue had been boiled away.   
In horrified pity and revulsion, Moray drew his knife and thrust it deep,   
piercing the man's heart. Clutching hands slowly released the bobbing keg, and   
the captain of the _Saunders_ slipped under and disappeared.   
The longboats had been tossed and wallowed by the waves, but Guthrie   
and Tag rowed over to Moray and pulled both him and the keg aboard. Soon   
they were back on the _Fleance_, dousing small fires started by burning debris.   
They'd lost twenty men and salvaged six from the _Saunders_, who had pleaded to   
be allowed to join the crew.   
The ship's cook passed out grog, the rum only slightly watered. The   
surgeon went about his business, but when he came to Moray, it seemed once   
again the captain had had a lucky break, his enemy being between him and the   
worst of the explosion. His only wound was a faint scratch on the left arm, and   
his dip into the ocean had washed away the worst of the blood that would have   
exposed it as originally being far worse.   
"I told ye t'was suicide!" Guthrie snapped. "Why, if we'd rammed her a   
touch harder, 'twould have been like the _Magdalena_ for us all! And for what?   
One keg? Twenty men dead and twice that wounded, for a cask of sugar, most   
likely!" He lashed out at it with his foot.   
The keg, weakened and scorched black in places, cracked open and   
emptied its contents onto the deck in a glittering torrent.   
Diamonds.   
Uncut diamonds.   
"God and all the saints," one of the sailors said softly.   
"A cask of sugar?" Moray asked Guthrie.   
A cheer rang to the crow's nest. The crew would have fallen upon the   
treasure as children in later centuries would dive upon piñata candy, but Moray   
ordered them back and scooped the diamonds into a bag.   
"Each man will have his share," he promised again, "But we'll need to   
divide them fairly."   
Some grumbling, not entirely surprised, greeted this. Moray noted the   
look that passed between Guthrie and a few of the other crewmen, not a look he   
cared for, but he was certain that once they'd gotten their share of the prize, they   
would be more jovial.   
"There's papers in here as well," Tag said, holding up a half-dozen rolls   
of thick parchment bound with ribbon and sealed with stamped dollops of wax.   
"Give them over," Moray said, a thrill going through him at the sight of   
that seal. No wonder the _Saunders_ captain had been willing to destroy his ship!   
The diamonds were bounty enough, but magic scrolls as well?   
Thanks to his experiences with the Sisters, he had devoted much time to   
the study of secret arcane arts -- which was why it had been so ironically funny   
in 1603 when Demona had tried to arrange his trial and would-be execution for   
the crime of sorcery, for she had no idea he truly was capable of some of the   
things of which he was accused.   
Once the _Fleance_ was underway, he returned to his cabin and locked the   
bag of diamonds into his seachest, along with the scrolls.   
They sought a deserted cove where they could careen and repair the   
ship, a task which the carpenter estimated would take several weeks. During that   
time, Moray examined the scrolls, determining the safest way to open them.   
He found, to his surprise, that one of them contained information about   
gargoyles. Not the sort with which he was familiar, Demona and her ilk, but   
gargoyles who turned to wood with the rising of the sun, who made their homes   
on ships instead of castles. Here was a spell to waken them even at the hottest   
noonday of summer, here was one to imprison them in sleep ...   
Although the weeks of work -- making their camp, winching the   
_Fleance_ onto the beach, scraping her hull, repairing the holes, caulking the   
planking, applying the pungent sulfur-and-tallow mix to deter teredo worms,   
hunting, fishing, drying and smoking the catch, mending and making barrels,   
gathering and preparing herbs for the surgeon -- were hard and unpleasant, the   
crew were in high spirits.   
Moray was soon to find out why ... 

* * 

**Manhattan**   
**May, 2000**

"Mutiny," Birdie said. "The bastards mutinied on you, didn't they?"   
MacBeth sighed heavily. "The diamonds were too great a temptation.   
Bosun Guthrie convinced them that I would keep most of the haul for myself,   
leaving scant shares for the men. Enough of them believed him to let him seize   
the camp, and most of the others joined their cause soon after. I was left with   
only a handful of loyal men, and the battle was over before it really began.   
"They killed two of my men, took the rest prisoner, and demanded that I   
hand over the diamonds and command of the ship to Guthrie. They planned to   
take me to St. Kitts, where the governor was offering a substantial price on my   
head for an incident some years previous.   
"But matters got out of hand. The men fell to arguing, fearing   
retaliation from the rightful owners of those diamonds should they appear too   
soon. Finally, Guthrie suggested burying the swag, something done much less   
frequently than movies would have you believe.   
"During the days it took them to settle these debates, I was able to sway   
some of the mutineers back to my side. Guthrie learned of this, and decided that   
I was too great a danger to be left alive. And so, when they buried the treasure,   
they shot me through the heart and threw me into the hole as well."   
"Fifteen men on a dead man's chest," Birdie said, shocked.   
"Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum," he finished gravely.   
"They didn't know ..."   
"So there I was, left for dead atop a chest containing a fortune in   
diamonds and six scrolls. I began to recover quickly, but by then I was buried   
alive. I could hear and feel each successive spadeful of sand and earth as it   
landed atop the rest, filling in the hole. Pain ran all through my chest, I could   
scarcely scrape out room to breathe, and I must have died countless times over   
from taking in the used-up air, then reviving."   
Birdie took a deep breath, her own lungs automatically tightening.   
"Jeez-Louise! How did you get out of that one?"   
"I dug," he said. "Bit by bit, gradually forcing myself up through the   
loose soil. Until at last I broke through."   
"How long were you down there?"   
"I don't recall, and I prefer it that way. Yet to this day, I am not terribly   
fond of enclosed spaces."   
"No wonder!"   
"Once I had recovered, I dug up the diamonds and scrolls. Eventually, I   
hailed a passing ship and made my way to London. I had been somewhat soured   
on piracy by then, and vowed to do what I could to put an end to it. In 1695, I   
commissioned a new ship and returned to the Caribbean, and set about making a   
new name for myself as a pirate hunter." 

* * 

**Excerpt from a letter to Albert Barker  
From his brother Henry, a passenger aboard the _Marie Jeanette  
_August 14th, 1698  
  
** ... when another sail was sighted and the lookout identified it as the  
_Valorous_, the ship of the man coming to be called the Scottish Rogue. This threw  
our captor, named Santiago, into no small distress and he gave the order to get  
underway.  
As this was midday, the gargoyles of the _Wyvern_ were all in wood,  
unmoveable in their perches alongside the ship. Santiago, being more concerned  
for his own fate, took the _Marie Jeanette_ and left the _Wyvern_ with a skeleton  
crew to follow or fend for themselves.  
The _Marie Jeanette_ still laden with provisions and goods as well as we  
seven prisoners, and as such was slower than either other ship. A fog had begun  
to settle, further making difficult the endeavors of the crews to stay near one  
another. Soon the _Wyvern_ was gone from our sight.  
The _Valorous_ overtook us, this despite Santiago's (in my mind craven)  
attempt to divert the attention of the _Valorous_ after the _Wyvern_ by playing upon  
the fears with which many hold gargoyles.  
There followed the only words spoken by the Scottish Rogue that I  
remember clearly. A great and powerful man he was, of advanced years by the  
silver of his hair and the tremendous weight of years that seemed in his eyes, but  
you and I should hope to handle ourselves half so well when we are that age, my  
faithful Albert.  
"I have no quarrel with _these_ gargoyles," said he. "Not yet, at any  
rate."  
And with that, he and his men made short work of Santiago's cutthroats,  
and took excellent care of us and saw us safely to Santo Domingo ...  
  
* *  
  
**The Atlantic Ocean  
November 1705  
  
** "I must find her, man!" Henri Nejou declared, his voice ripe with  
brandy and desperation.  
"We will find her," the man now calling himself Findleagh Moray said.  
"Ours is the faster ship. Your Isabelle will be restored to you."  
"If they've harmed her ..." Nejou broke off with a strangled sob.  
"They'll not harm her," Moray said grimly. "If that had been their intent,  
they would have done so already."  
This failed to comfort Nejou, who, in his shirtsleeves hoisted the brandy  
bottle and took a swig straight from the neck. "But when they reach Algiers --"  
"They will not."  
"My precious Isabelle! Sold to some fat, oily pasha?"  
"I tell you, my friend, it will not happen."  
"I once thought I would lose her to you," Nejou confided. "I thought  
then that I should rather devour my own liver than see that, but now I would  
gladly stand aside and wish you all the luck in the world, if only to see her again,  
free and unhurt!"  
"She loves you, Henri," Moray assured him. "You will be reunited, this  
I vow."  
He upended the brandy bottle again, this time draining it, and by now  
his urgent pacing of the cabin had taken on a tilt contrary to the pitch of the  
deck. "From the moment I saw her," he said. "Loved her from that moment.  
Picking flowers in her father's garden. Her hair had the luster of polished  
cherrywood, and those eyes, like the winter sea on a cloudy day! I had never  
seen such a beautiful creature!"  
"Yes," Moray said softly, lost in his own reminiscences.  
"Do you remember ..." Henri chuckled drunkenly. "D'you remember the  
time we even dueled over her? I thought I had you!"  
Moray rubbed his chest. "If not for the medallion that had been a gift to  
... to my great-grandfather ... from Queen Elizabeth, you may well have slain me  
that day," he lied.  
"What was I thinking? Dueling with my own best friend. Why, if I  
_had_ slain you, Isabelle would have been furious. She was furious anyway.  
D'you remember how she threw that vase at me, shouted at us both? For  
foolishness, she said. That we'd be shooting each other over her? She'd sooner  
have neither of us!"  
"I remember."  
"I shtill ... still don't know how I won her," Henri said. He picked up a  
silken handkerchief, regarded it for a moment, and then crushed it to his weeping  
eyes.  
Moray caught a ghost of a scent. Lilies. Isabelle's perfume. His heart  
wrenched in his chest. But he showed no sign of it, just patted Henri firmly on  
the shoulder.  
"My Isabelle!" Henri choked.  
"We will find her! I swear!"  
So vowing, he left Henri to his own grief and worry, and went above.  
Still no sign of their prey, the pirate galleon _Sea Hawk_. Still no sign, and with  
each day that passed, pretty Isabelle's fate grew more bleak. If they did not  
overtake the _Sea Hawk_ before it reached Algiers ... but no, that did not bear  
thinking on.  
He remained on deck until night fell, then returned to his cabin. Henri  
was sprawled face-down on a fine rug, snoring thickly, a second bottle of brandy  
in his outflung hand.  
"I thought I'd locked that cupboard," Moray said to himself. "Ah, well,  
old friend, at least your sleep will be deep." He covered Henri with a blanket and  
went to bed.  
Distant gunfire brought him instantly and fully alert, moments before  
one of the crew hammered on his door. Henri still had not moved, and showed  
no signs of stirring even when a sudden roll of the ship made Moray stumble  
over him.  
A tropical storm had whipped the sea into a landscape of troughs and  
valleys, with curling curds of white foam at the tops of the slate-grey waves.  
Lightning flashed on the horizon, but Moray didn't think for a moment that he'd  
mistaken the sound of thunder for that of pistols.  
"It's the _Sea Hawk_, captain," the crewman reported. "And another ship,  
a merchantman flying the English flag. Or was, afore she struck her colors."  
"Close in," Moray ordered. "Ready the cannons, but hold your fire."  
"Aye, sir."  
He hurried to the rail and took the proferrered spyglass from his second  
mate. The _Sea Hawk_ swam into view in the circle of the lens. The other ship was  
the _Cecily_, and by the look of it, they had surrendered promptly. The gunfire  
looked celebratory, the pirates firing into the air as they gleefully looted the  
holds.  
Just then, the sky opened like a faucet. The gunfire instantly ceased;  
black powder was unreliable in the best of conditions, and all but useless in the  
rain. Moray lost sight of both ships, seeing nothing but hissing sheets of dull  
silver.  
"If we can't see them ..." he said, then turned to his crew. He was  
already drenched to the skin, as were they all, but they knew what was expected  
of them.  
"Cutlasses," he said. "Prepare to board."  
"Should I wake Lord Nejou?" the cabin boy, Pierre, asked anxiously.  
"No," Moray decided. Even if they could rouse Henri, he would be in  
no condition to fight, and they hadn't come all this way just to let him die in  
Isabelle's arms. If all went well, Henri could awaken to the sight of his bride-to-  
be's beautiful smile.  
He belted on his own cutlass and tucked a flintlock boarding pistol into  
his sash beneath his coat. The ship kept to her course, and now and then through  
the shifting rain, Moray was afforded a view of the _Sea Hawk_ and the _Cecily_.  
Hopefully, the pirates would be so concerned with stowing their haul that they  
wouldn't notice the _Valorous_ upon them until it was too late.  
Closer now.  
His crew waited, tense and silent and armed to the teeth. Men held to  
the rails, grappling hooks and rope piled in neat coils at their feet.  
A gust of powerful wind belled the _Valorous_' sails outward and made  
the ship leap like a toy sailboat blown by a child across a mudpuddle. The mast  
creaked in protest. One line snapped and the end whipsawed through the air,  
striping a weal across a crewman before it was wrestled into submission.  
The sheets of rain parted, and they were almost atop the _Sea Hawk_.  
Now the enemy crew was aware of them, their shouts of alarm audible even over  
the storm. They began to come about for a broadside, but were too late.  
Grappling hooks flew like striking snakes, catching on the rails of the  
_Sea Hawk_. Moray's men pulled with all their strength, locking the ships together,  
while their companions swung or leaped or clambered over and engaged the _Sea  
Hawk's_ crew.  
Cutlass against cutlass, the deck planking slippery with first rainwater  
and then shed blood as the battle was joined. Moray led the charge, hacking his  
way toward the helm. He spied the enemy captain, backing toward the longboats  
with a struggling woman held before him.  
Isabelle!  
Her glorious cherrywood hair was turned to sodden maroon strands, her  
eyes and mouth were wide in terror, her gown was soaked and pasted to her  
body. The captain held a knife to her neck, the point dimpling that smooth skin,  
a bead of blood already welling.  
Moray advanced, his jaw set tight, a cutlass in one hand and the large  
  
parrying-knife known as a _main-gauche_ gripped in the other.  
Three men moved to block his way. Two were the lowest and scurviest  
type of cutthroats to be found in any a seaside town. The third was a tall man  
with long black hair, and as he raised his cutlass, startled recognition filled his  
eyes.  
"Captain?"  
"Tag!" Moray said in astonishment. The youth of eighteen had become  
a man of thirty-five, but still easily recognizable.  
"I thought ... I'd heard ... they said you killed Bosun Guthrie in a  
Kingston tavern six years ago, but I never believed ... you look just the ..."  
"What are you waiting for? Kill him!" the enemy captain ordered.  
"No!" Tag whirled and put himself between Moray and the two other  
men.  
"Findleagh!" Isabelle gasped, extending one pale, trembling hand.  
"You treacherous dog!" the captain bellowed at Tag.  
Cutlasses clashed as the two other men attempted to cut down their  
former crewmate. The captain dragged Isabelle back, throwing a quick glance  
over his shoulder to the waiting longboat below.  
Moray hesitated, torn between the woman he loved and the man he'd  
raised as his own son.  
"Don't worry about me!" Tag yelled, deftly disarming one opponent and  
matching blades with the second.  
Knowing that to say such words all but ensured Tag's death, Moray  
nonetheless had no choice. The captain saw him coming and set the knife's edge  
to Isabelle's neck.  
"Another step and I'll slice her up like bait."  
"Findleagh --!" she pleaded.  
"Let her go," Moray said, "and we'll finish this between us."  
"Do you think me a fool? Stand down!"  
He was weary of debate. He slowly extended his arm, letting the cutlass  
drop to the rain-slick deck.  
"And the knife!"  
Moray complied.  
A hideous gurgling scream came from just behind him as Tag opened  
the belly of one of his foes. Moray didn't turn, didn't look, but the captain's eyes  
flicked that way and his arm around Isabelle loosened for just an instant. The  
instant Moray had been waiting for.  
He yanked the concealed pistol from beneath his coat and fired,  
knowing that a malfunction now would mean Isabelle's death.  
The pistol roared, belching black smoke and jerking in Moray's hand.  
The ball took the captain in the side of the jaw, shattering it so that fragments of  
broken teeth sprayed from his mouth like bits of crockery. His head snapped  
back, he collided with the rail.  
Moray sprang forward, seized Isabelle, and delivered a kick to the  
stomach that sent the captain of the Sea Hawk over the side. Then Isabelle was in  
his arms, pressed against his chest, shaking like a leaf in a gale.  
"Oh, Findleagh!" she wept.  
He let himself hold her for a moment and turned to Tag, expecting to  
see the younger man fall. But contrary to his expectations, Tag was still standing,  
breathing hard and bleeding from a cut to the forearm but otherwise unhurt.  
Beyond him, the crew of the Valorous had succeeded in overpowering the  
pirates.  
Victory was theirs!  
Isabelle was safe!  
With a heavy heart, Moray let go of her and set her gently away from  
him.  
"Let's go see Henri," he said.  
  
* *  
  
**Manhattan  
May, 2000  
  
** "So you saved her and she went home with Henri, huh?" Birdie asked.  
"She was his bride-to-be," MacBeth said.  
"Still reeks. You're the hero; shouldn't you get the girl?"  
He laughed, not without some bitterness. "Is that what I am? As it  
turned out, it wouldn't have mattered. Isabelle died three years later."  
"Oh. Oh, I'm sorry."  
"She died of a fever. I was worried for Henri's sanity. If not for Giselle,  
I believe he may have gone mad."  
"Who's Giselle?"  
"Their daughter," MacBeth said slowly. "She was born in 1707, only a  
year old when her mother died. Henri was devoted to her, but because he was  
concerned for her safety, he raised her as a boy. Until she was thirteen, that is. At  
that point, her ... burgeoning womanhood ... made such a continued ruse  
impossible. Some women can manage it, but Giselle was to become very buxom,  
and of sweetly abundant hips."  
Birdie looked down at herself. "Yeah, I get the picture; I'd have a hard  
time passing myself off as a boy too."  
"It didn't matter so much by then; Henri was governor of St. Gilbert and  
his seagoing days were mostly at an end. He had his duties and his plantations to  
oversee, and his daughter's future to think of."  
MacBeth paused, sighing.  
"And, oh, how she resembled her mother."  
Birdie's eyebrows went up. "I'm getting the feeling there's still a lot  
more to this story."  
"Yes ... in 1722, I married her."  
"Jump _back_! You married a ..." she did some quick subtracting, "... a  
fifteen-year-old girl? And you fed me that line about being too old for me?"  
"As you said, there is still a lot more to this story ..."  
  
* *  
  
**Kingston, Jamaica  
September 1717  
  
** "Why should I believe you?" Emil Santiago asked scornfully.  
"Fer I were thar, boy! I seen yer father die!"  
All around them, the Running Roach Tavern was rioting with noise and  
activity.  
About a third of the patrons were gathered around a wooden box on the  
floor, wagering fortunes on racing roaches. Another third were engaged in lively  
games of knucklebones or Squall (or the attendant arguments that went along  
with each). The last third were involved in a variety of other pursuits ranging  
from solitary steady drinking to negotiating with the blowzy whores that lined  
the bar.  
Nobody was paying attention to the corner conversation. Emil himself,  
twenty, hot-blooded, and hell-bent on avenging the father he'd known only  
through his mother's stories, looked with wary disdain at the man sitting opposite  
him.  
Sitting, perhaps, not the best word. Sprawled, more like it. Overflowing  
his chair in all directions. The only narrow part of him was the stout wooden peg  
that replaced his left leg at the knee. His beard lay over his vast bulging belly  
like a hairy blanket, clotted with food and matted to the point that Emil would  
not have been surprised to see a rat's head emerge for a quick look-around.  
He stank, too, like a gone-over egg soaked in vinegar. But it was only  
one more rank odor among many, so Emil leaned closer.  
"You were aboard the _Marie Jeanette_?"  
Fat Jim nodded and knocked his fist against his wooden leg -- a bit of a  
reach, but he made it. "Whar d'ye think I got this? I were thar, right enough."  
"And it was Moray, the one they call the Scottish Rogue, who killed my  
father?"  
"Shot 'im through the brainpan, 'e did. But 'twas the gargoyles what let  
him die. If the _Wyvern_'d stayed with us, we'd've sent that Scot to the bottom o'  
the briny sea. They turned tail and run, the cowards, an' left us all to die. So, me  
boyo, if ye're lookin' for who killed yer father, don' just look ter the Scot. Look  
ter the gargoyles what betrayed him."  
"I knew it! No good can come of allying with such hellspawn! The  
Scottish Rogue was a pirate hunter, aye, doing his job though that won't save him  
from my sword. But the gargoyles, who betrayed their own captain -- they are  
the ones who must suffer! But how? No vessel on the seas can best the _Wyvern_!"  
"Not by night, aye," Fat Jim said cunningly.  
"No one ever sees the damnable ship by day!" Emil said.  
"I've a plan that may do for ye, boyo. I've two nephews, an' as luck  
would have it, one be a ship's cook --"  
"Which would explain much," Emil muttered.  
Fat Jim either didn't hear or pretended not to. "Aboard the _Paris Maid_,  
which be Le Nez's ship. Le Nez be sworn enemies o' Benedict Tate, the  
_Wyvern's_ captain. An' the other nephew, Bloody Pete, 'e be Tate's first mate."  
"What are you proposing, old salt?" Emil was more interested now, a  
plan already forming in his mind. "And what do you want out of it?"  
"Same's ye, same's ye. Revenge. I bore the mocking o' those devil-  
beasts many a year, an' this leg o' mine were but the injury added to the insult. I'd  
see 'em gone, one an' all."   
  
* *  
  
**Near Vera Cruz, in the Gulf of Mexico  
March 1720  
  
** "'Tain't right, sailing without our captain," said Alistair Phipps, second  
mate of the _Wyvern_.  
"On his own orders, it was," Bloody Pete, the first mate, disputed  
testily. "We're in need of provisions, and sugar's cheapest in Campeche."  
"Could've waited for the captain."  
"He be sunk balls-deep in that mistress o' his," Bloody Pete said. "Ye  
know as well as I that thar be no reasoning with him once he's started thinking o'  
those sweet tits."  
Alistair, who had harbored a secret and poetic love for Ione even if she  
_was_ the captain's mistress, didn't take kindly to Pete's words. "She is a good  
and decent lady --" he began.  
"Imp! Come back here!" a female voice interrupted.  
Just then, two small forms pelted past, nearly toppling Pete and Alistair  
off their feet.  
Imp, the spiny-backed hatchling that was the veritable apple of the  
whole clan's eye, was riding astride the gargoyle beast Chimera, who disproved  
the old adage that two heads were better than one. Or, perhaps, if Chimera had  
had only two heads instead of three, he would have been better able to decide  
where he was going. As was, he always crossed the deck in something of a  
whirling crablike scramble, trying to go three ways at once, and as a result, the  
twosome _did_ run into the approaching quartermaster and knocked him cursing  
onto his backside.  
"I swear, woman!" the quartermaster roared, lurching upright to  
confront bare-breasted Melusine as she pursued the rambunctious pair. "Get that  
brat o' yours out from underfoot or I'll lash 'im to the mizzenmast!"  
"My apologies," Melusine said, plucking Imp from his perch.  
"He's gotten into the chickpeas again!" raged the ship's cook, storming  
toward them waving a cleaver. "And that pet of his tore the very devil out of a  
whole sack of salt pork!"  
The rushing swoop of wings heralded Reaper's arrival, the clan leader  
landing majestically between his mate and the irate crew. He socked the end of  
his scythe handle against the deck, looking from one to the next impatiently.  
"What is all the ruckus?"  
"I don't know what we're going to do with him!" Melusine said, yet in  
her tone was more of an indulgence than a true exasperation -- isn't my Imp a sly  
little thing? it said.  
"I can't run a proper galley like this!" the cook all but screamed. "When  
the whole crew's got naught to eat but biscuits, they'll have those two to thank for  
it!"  
"None of the other hatchlings cause so much trouble," Scylla said  
smugly, hefting her own two onto her hips. "You spoil him, sister."  
"Imp," Reaper said sternly, "what have you to say for yourself?"  
Imp turned large, soulful eyes to the humans. "I'm sowwy," he mumbled  
around the thumb corked in his mouth.  
"Oh, there, see?" crooned Melusine. "He meant no harm."  
"He'll never learn unless you discipline him," Scylla said.  
"What would you have me do, lock him in the rookery hold all night?"  
Melusine snapped.  
"Praise God!" the cook cried, flinging his hands in the air. "A whole  
night of peace?"  
"I will do no such thing!" Melusine said indignantly.  
Brand landed beside them in a glowing corona of fire. "You'd better.  
And all of the other hatchlings as well. Our patrol has sighted the _Paris Maid_,  
and she's almost upon us!"  
At that announcement, the crew went into action. Humans and  
gargoyles alike prepared for battle. Madre, which was what they all called the  
matronly she-garg in charge of looking after the rookery, shepherded the young  
ones below while the rest took to the air in anticipation.  
Not once did anyone think to signal the _Paris Maid_ and inform Le Nez  
that his archrival, Benedict Tate, was not even aboard. Le Nez, who had earned  
his nickname after Benedict's sword had flayed his nose wide open so that it now  
clung to his face like an ugly flower, wouldn't have believed them even if they  
had.  
Alistair, who had been a jeweler's apprentice before being lured to the  
sea by talk of fabulous wealth and high adventure, checked and re-checked his  
pistols nervously as he looked out over the dark and silent sea. Although he  
couldn't see anything, he could almost sense the deadly weight of the _Paris Maid  
_closing in.  
He glanced over at Bloody Pete as he would have glanced over at  
Benedict, for reassurance. But Pete, he realized, had never led the crew into  
battle before, and was probably even more nervous than Alistair himself.  
What's this? Either Pete was the best playactor Alistair had ever seen ...  
or ... was that a knowing look in his eye? An _expectant_ look? Was there some  
treachery afoot?  
"Sail ho!" came the cry from the crow's nest, and then the _Paris Maid  
_hove into view.  
"Attack!" Reaper thundered from on high. "Defend our ship! Defend  
our home!"  
Cannons and flintlocks began to hammer their deadly music into the  
night, and Alistair put all other thoughts but survival and victory from his mind.  
  
* *  
  
**Veradoga Island  
May 2000  
  
** "There he goes again," Brand murmured, nudging Melusine and  
motioning toward Reaper.  
Their leader, sitting at the mouth of the cave and staring out at the  
hissing curtain of the falls, had slumped into a melancholy. His dark-and-light  
bone patterned arms were propped on his knees, hands dangling almost  
lifelessly. His scythe leaned desolately against the wall.  
"He blames himself," Melusine said softly. "Had you and he not gone  
after the _Paris Maid_ --"  
"We would have been destroyed alongside our brothers and sisters,"  
Brand cut in. "And you, Imp, and Chimera would have been left alone. There  
was nothing he, or I, or any of us could have done."  
"If we'd patrolled more diligently, we might have seen the _Venganza  
_laying in wait beyond that island. We might have found out what Santiago meant  
to do."  
"But we didn't," Brand said harshly. "What use is it dwelling on the  
past? If not for the fisherman who saw the _Venganza_ leaving after destroying our  
clan, we never would have known who to seek revenge against. We would have  
had nothing. We did at the time what we thought was best, and that is all. His  
brooding like that does him, and us, no good."  
"Leave him be! He lost his clan --"  
"We all lost our clan. I lost my mate, our child. What gives _him_ the  
right to make as if the weight of all the world's wrongs is upon his shoulders? I  
recall how it was when we returned that next night, sister mine, to find the  
_Wyvern_ half-sunk on that sandbar, not a sign of life aboard her, the sea around  
littered with shards and flotsam that had been our clan. He thought you were  
dead; to this day his grief-stricken cry chills me to the soul. In the face of his  
anguish, my own seemed diminished, swallowed up. But _you_ lived, sister. His  
mate and child were restored to him. So if any carry the greater burden now, it  
should be me!"  
Melusine touched Brand's brow ridge. "Brother ... I had no idea you felt  
so strongly! It is Reaper's nature to take all the sufferings of his clan upon  
himself; I never stopped to think that it might dim our own sorrows."  
"It does no good," he said, brushing her hand away. "The past is gone.  
We lost our ship, our clan, and eventually our freedom. Now we are here, and we  
should make a new place for ourselves, carve it out of this modern era just as our  
elders did when first they sailed." Having said his piece, loud enough for Reaper  
not to have missed a word of it, he stalked off.  
"Yet ... how can we forget the past?" Melusine wondered quietly to  
herself. "When it is still so very fresh in our minds?"  
  
* *  
  
**Near Vera Cruz, in the Gulf of Mexico  
March 1720  
  
** In the rookery hold of the _Wyvern_, Melusine yawned and stretched,  
shaking wood chips out of her hair. She checked her side, just above where her  
skin and scales merged. The wound was gone, completely healed by a day's  
sleep.  
"Hungry, Mama," Imp said.  
Chimera capered around her flukes, obviously in agreement with Imp.  
"Are you to be my good little hatchling tonight?" she asked, picking  
him up. "You were into much mischief last night. You know when there's a battle  
you're supposed to stay down here."  
"Didn't want to."  
"And you didn't mind Madre, either."  
"Wanna be a warrior," he informed her, jutting his jaw.  
"And you will," she promised. "A great warrior, like your father. But  
not until you're grown. You could have been hurt last night. A battle is no place  
for pranks."  
He pouted. "Wanna help."  
"When you're older," she said. "For now, my little one, you must do as  
Reaper and Madre and I say. We don't want to have to spend another day down  
here, do we? We should be on our perches, in positions of pride and honor."  
"I will, Mama," he agreed, with such a sigh that it was as if she'd asked  
him to give up all that he held most dear.  
Chimera growled and whined, scratching at the floor.  
"What is it?" Melusine set Imp down, only now noticing that the floor  
seemed to have a pronounced tilt, and that it was far damper down here than  
normal. Further ... she saw that the belongings of the clan had shifted, sliding  
against the hull. She herself had awakened in a different spot, some five yards  
from where she'd been before.  
"Mama --"  
"Hush, Imp."  
She listened. None of the usual shipboard noises came to her ears. And  
the constant swaying motion had ceased. The ship was not moving. No sails  
belled or flapped in the wind.  
"Becalmed?" she asked herself, knowing even as she said it that it  
wasn't right. Even becalmed, even with the sea smooth as glass, there would be  
some sense of movement, some gentle rising and falling as if the Wyvern rested  
upon the breast of a sleeping giant.  
"Mama --"  
"Hush, I said!"  
Hurt, he stuck his lip sullenly out and kicked at the soggy straw. She  
never spoke to him like that, and was instantly sorry. But she couldn't comfort  
him now; something was badly amiss.  
"Have we run aground?" She thrust her tail against the planks,  
undulating toward the hatch leading up to the deck.  
The ship was canted at an angle that made the stairs, never easy for her,  
an impossibility. She used her strong arms instead, hauling herself to the hatch.  
When she made to throw it open, it only moved a few inches before colliding  
with something heavy that held it shut.  
What she saw through that narrow opening, though, was enough to send  
the blood fleeing from her face. Her mouth gaped, the dainty gills along the  
undersides of her jaw fluttered.  
"Mama, what is it?" Imp, fearful and subdued, crept to her side.  
Melusine could not speak. Her eyes darted around what little she could  
see of the deck. The human bodies were the least of her concerns. The wood ...  
the long jagged splinters and the hewn chunks and the identifiable limbs and  
torsos with wedges hacked out of them ...  
A scream built in her, but she could not release it. Instead, in desperate  
denial, she slammed the hatch and clutched her son to her chest. This was some  
dream, yes, she would yawn and stretch anew in a few moments and everything  
would be back to normal.  
She held Imp too tight but ignored his protests and squirms. She rocked,  
back and forth on the bunched muscles of her tail. Chimera crouched next to her,  
making a low worried noise in his throats.  
She didn't know how long she stayed like that, but then her shock was  
broken by Reaper's voice, from out on the platforms above the cannon ports.  
"My ... angel of the deep!" he choked. And then a long, drawn-out howl  
of rage and loss made the timbers shake.  
"Reaper!" she called, dropping Imp and flinging herself to batter  
against the hatch. "My love, we're in here!"  
How could she have forgotten? Last night, after the battle had taken  
fearful tolls on both sides, the _Paris Maid_ had turned to flee. A foolish mistake  
on their part; didn't they realize that in a mere hour or two, half the _Wyvern's  
_fighting force would be rendered immobile with the dawn?  
But Le Nez hadn't wanted to lose any more of his men, and with barely  
a handful left, had come about and sailed for the horizon. Reckoning without the  
wings of gargoyles.  
Reaper and Brand followed, confident that they could chase off those  
cowards by themselves to prevent them from returning during the day. They  
hadn't returned in time! They'd been spared the fate that had befallen the rest of  
the clan!  
"My love!" She pounded harder.  
"Papa!" Imp joined her, and Chimera bayed loudly.  
Debris slammed against the deck, a broken mast by the sound of it, and  
then the hatch was wrenched open. Reaper's shadow blotted out the stars.  
"My ... my love?" he asked, hardly daring to believe. "You're alive!"  
She propelled herself into his arms, weeping.  
"Are there any others?" Brand asked pleadingly.  
Melusine shook her head. "Are they ..."  
"Gone," Reaper said. "Our clan is gone. Only we five are left."  
"What of the _Paris Maid_?"  
"Burnt," Brand said grimly. "We finished off Le Nez and his crew, but  
by then daybreak was upon us. We spent the day asleep, adrift. But before we  
left, I set her ablaze."  
"Then who ...?" Melusine looked around at the horror clearly revealed  
by moonlight and the strong glow from Brand's wings. "Who did this?"  
"We will find out," Reaper swore. "And then we will have our  
revenge."  
  
* *  
  
**Manhattan  
May 2000  
  
** Birdie, bundled in a cushy terrycloth robe with the hotel's name stitched  
on the left breast, opened the door and admitted room service. Class all the way,  
she thought as the uniformed man wheeled in a cart. Just like in the movies.  
He was about her own age and couldn't keep from giving her an  
interested once-over, which turned to a look of surprise as MacBeth, in a  
matching robe, emerged from the bathroom toweling his hair. MacBeth merely  
returned the look coolly as he signed for the bill.  
"I need a message delivered to my uncle," Birdie said, handing him a  
fiver and a sealed envelope (hotel stationery too). "Brendan Vandermere. He's  
attending the conference, or was. You might find him panting after one of the  
speakers, Dakota Jones."  
He nodded and left, and Birdie chuckled.  
"For all I know, Uncle Brendan's in the room next door," she said with  
a sly wink at MacBeth.  
"He would," MacBeth pointed out, grinning slightly, "have recognized  
your voice."  
"People always ask, 'are you a moaner or a screamer,' and I say, why be  
so limited?" She started lifting lids, and oohed. "You sure know how to spoil a  
girl! What'd you do, tell them to send up one of everything from the dessert  
menu?"  
"Very nearly," he said. "Except for the fruit cup and the sorbet."  
"Yeah, to hell with the lowfat healthy stuff!" She patted her hips.  
"Maintaining a bod like this takes some serious calories!"  
"Do it with my blessings." He scooped a finger through a blob of  
custard and brought it to her lips.  
She took her time slurping it off, then fed him a hearty dollop of  
chocolate mousse in the same fashion. They ended up parking the cart next to the  
bed, feeding each other in between long slow kisses and leisurely foreplay. Not  
at all to Birdie's disappointment, one thing led to another and they eventually  
agreed that they should have showered _after_ dessert.  
"So," she said, "where were we before we were so sweetly -- in every  
sense of the word -- interrupted?"  
"I was about to tell you of Giselle, of St. Gilbert, of Santiago and the  
gargoyles ..."  
  
* *  
  
**St. Gilbert, also known as Dead Man's Cove  
September, 1721  
  
** The _Lady MacBeth_, a lovely schooner of clean and classic lines, a swift  
and sure ship known with dread by every dark-hearted scallywag who sailed  
beneath the Jolly Roger, sailed into the sheltered harbor of St. Gilbert.  
Once known as Dead Man's Cove as the result of a fierce battle that had  
left the waters choked with corpses, now the gentle bay curved against the docks  
of a tidy, thriving town. The governor's manor sat on a hill at the east end of the  
bay, overlooking the town and the fields. A small fort guarded the point. The  
people looked happy and prosperous.  
"It seems Nejou is doing a fine job," Tag remarked as he followed  
Moray down the gangplank of the _Lady MacBeth_.  
It often caught Moray with a startling pang of concern that the boy who  
he had taken from his dying mother's arms with a promise to look after him, now  
appeared to be of an age with him.  
Tag's black hair had greyed considerably over the past decade and a  
half, and lines had begun to carve themselves more deeply into his sea-weathered  
face. He had a wife now, pretty Bonita Alvarez in Havana, and although Tag's  
duties as Moray's first mate kept him away more than half of each year, they had  
made good use of his shore leave and borne seven children.  
Moray, of course, remained unchanged by time's passage. His secret,  
known only to a few, was now known by one more.  
Once father and son, then mentor and student, they now climbed the  
slope to the governor's mansion as friends.  
Although the years had been kind to Tag, the same could not be said for  
Henri Nejou. Having nearly lost his beloved Isabelle before they'd even wed, he  
had made the most of their next few years. But her death had taken half of his  
life as well, until he lived for only two things: their daughter Giselle, and later  
for St. Gilbert.  
He came to meet them, leaning upon his cane. A wildly-swinging  
yardarm, torn loose in a terrible hurricane six years ago, had left him with a  
broken leg that had never healed properly. But his smile was wide, his eyes were  
bright.  
And his hospitality, as always, was beyond compare. Weeks at sea were  
soon forgotten as Moray and Tag were bathed, dressed in new clothes, and given  
the run of the grounds.  
Moray, hungering as he always did after a long voyage for fresh fruits  
and greens, took himself to the walled orchard that sprawled behind the house.  
He plucked a fat orange from a tree, peeling it with his thumbnail as he strolled  
beneath the shade-giving leaves.  
Perhaps Henri had the right idea, he thought as he walked. Perhaps  
retirement to a warm, peaceful plantation was what he should consider. He might  
be losing his taste for the wide waves, losing the inner fire that had driven him to  
become a pirate hunter.  
He'd been one of many last autumn trying to catch John Rackham, the  
infamous Calico Jack whose crew included the notorious Mary Read and Anne  
Bonney, but despite his best efforts he had consistently missed bringing them to  
justice. That honor had fallen to Jonathan Barnet, a brisk young fellow who had  
never even heard of the Scottish Rogue.  
Musing to himself that his time may have passed, he didn't notice the  
odd sounds at first, but finally they pierced his mind and he stopped, then looked  
toward the source of the rustling, under-the-breath genteel French oaths, and the  
irregular thump that sounded like someone kicking a mast.  
No, not a mast, a tree trunk, he saw, and had to bite the inside of his  
cheek to keep from laughing aloud at what he beheld.  
Giselle Nejou was dangling from a tree, her hands locked over a sturdy  
branch while her feet flailed for purchase, thumping against the trunk but finding  
none. A rickety ladder lay on the earth, near an overturned basket and a litter of  
oranges.  
"Are you in need of rescue?" he asked, unable to keep the amusement  
from his voice.  
She twisted toward him. Her elegant chignon had come half-askew and  
hung against her shoulder in a deep auburn mass. Her eyes were widely spaced, a  
clear green-grey fringed with dark lashes.  
It struck him with nearly physical force how like her mother she looked.  
Yes, Isabelle was there, in her coloring, in her features, in her shape -- far better  
revealed by the light gowns popular here in the islands than her mother's had  
ever been by the heavy fashions of Europe.  
"Are you going to stand there smiling, m'sieur, or help me down?"  
Giselle inquired.  
He bowed. "At once, dear lady."  
Crossing to beneath the tree, he grasped her legs, trying without  
measurable success to tell himself not to notice how nicely formed they were,  
how plump her thighs, how charmingly cushioned her hips. This was Giselle,  
daughter of one of his dearest friends. Giselle, who had been as a favored niece,  
very nearly as a daughter, to himself. Further, she was fourteen if she was a day,  
and never mind the womanly figure.  
Yes, he told himself all of those things, but as she dropped into his arms  
and her full breasts, riper than any oranges in the orchard, pushed against his  
chest, he doubted he was listening.  
"The ladder fell over," she told him as he released her, she apparently  
innocently unaware of the effect she was having upon him. She bent, and the late  
afternoon sun slanted through her gauzy skirt to outline her legs as she gathered  
the spilled oranges.  
Moray inwardly argued with himself, turning his eyes away. She was  
_not_ Isabelle, not the dear lost love he had never fully won. He should not look  
on her as he had once looked on her mother.  
He helped her pick up the fruit, then accompanied her back to the  
house. She filled his ears with lively chatter, her spirit shining bright and  
vivacious. Raised for the first several years of her life disguised as a boy, she had  
been accorded far more freedom and travel than most young ladies.  
They enjoyed a delicious dinner, the four of them, and spent the next  
several days touring the island, visiting the shops, and generally relaxing. St.  
Gilbert seemed like a bit of leftover paradise on earth  
The crew of the _Lady MacBeth_ had money to spend in the taverns and  
the brothel, so Moray knew he wouldn't be hearing from them until it was time to  
cast off again (and even then, he might have to send some men around to roust  
them from overindulgent binges in their various pleasures).  
On the dawn of their sixth day, Moray was awakened by the urgent  
tolling of the bell in the town square. He sat up in bed, his first thought being  
that a fire had broken out in one of the buildings.  
Then the gunfire began, and the panicked, wakeful screams of the  
townspeople.  
  
* *  
  
**Veradoga Island  
May 2000  
  
** Melusine descended to the grotto, to the seacave where the _Lady  
MacBeth_ waited. Not much of a ship, a mock-up of a true craft, made of some  
light but tough imitation wood. Engines were concealed in the hold, the sails  
mostly for show.  
Such ships they'd seen since their awakening! Enormous ships, larger  
than islands. Some carried stack upon stack of metal crates called boxcars, others  
were warships the likes of which no one had ever imagined. Five gargoyles and a  
false schooner could not hope to ever take such a prize. They had to limit  
themselves to pleasure boats, fishing vessels, and other small craft.  
She slipped into the water, sighing as it coursed over her scales. Not  
even gliding could compare to the sensual joy of swimming. She opened her  
wings, waving them in lazy finlike motions to steer as her tail moved her along.  
They would have to make some hard decisions soon, she knew. Their  
clan could not last forever like this, eking out a meager existence of piracy and  
hiding. They would have to seek out others of their kind. More warriors to fight.  
More females to breed. Brand was too practical to let his grieving get in the way  
of their future; he needed a new mate. Someday, Imp too would need one.  
Were there more of their kind? Other gargoyles, yes, their stone-turning  
landlubber cousins, but she wasn't even sure if two such diverse types could  
successfully breed. What would the children be? Wood, or stone?  
Three centuries ago, there had been rumors of clans in Polynesia.  
Gargoyles the humans worshipped as gods. Tikis, she believed they were called.  
Something like that.  
But at the time, sailing far around Cape Horn, the tip of South America,  
had been one of the most dangerous courses a ship could set. And there had been  
no need, as their own clan numbered in the strong dozens.  
Now, though? Now that, according to their charts, humans had cut a  
canal through Panama? The idea bore exploration. Surely, such a valuable canal  
would be guarded, though. And who would protect them during the day?  
She surfaced, rolling onto her back and watching the shadowed ripples  
dance on the cavern ceiling above. Even if such a long voyage were possible,  
would Reaper consider it? Would he be willing to let the past alone?  
Their revenge, after all, was not complete.  
Yes, those who had killed their clan were dead. Would be dead by now  
even if they hadn't personally seen to it. She flexed her claws, remembering how  
Santiago had begged for his life when Reaper pulled him from that prison cell in  
St. Gilbert. His pleas had fallen on deaf ears.  
There had been a moment, a brief and blessed moment, when their  
revenge _had_ been complete. Their clan had been avenged. It had taken three  
years, three long years of shipless wandering and fruitless searching, but at last it  
had been done.  
And then the Scottish Rogue had come along, and enspelled them.  
Robbed them of their satisfaction. Stolen their world from them, leaving them to  
revive three centuries later in a strange and foreign one. Where they found that,  
by some sorcery, their foe yet lived.  
_That_ score had yet to be settled.  
  
* *  
  
**St. Gilbert  
September, 1721  
  
** When the battle was over, Moray was able to piece together what had  
happened, and felt dire guilt burrowing into his heart like a worm.  
His fault.  
When would he learn? He'd slain Duncan but spared Canmore, and then  
Canmore had come back. Now here was another enemy's son, glaring up at him  
from his bonds.  
"Emil Santiago," he said.  
"My father was Enrique Santiago; you killed him!" the young man spat.  
"For that, I will have your life!"  
"Good fortune to you," Moray muttered. Louder, addressing the  
captive, he said, "For that, you've attacked this town, murdered innocent people?  
If you wanted me, pup, you should have come for me! Not lead your army  
against those who have done you no wrong!"  
The attack had come not just by sea, where the fort's cannons would  
have been able to repel an assault, but overland. The _Venganza_ had moored on  
the far coast of the island, and Santiago's men made the trek through the jungles  
and farmlands to come at the town from its less-defended side.  
Once they'd taken the fort, more ships poured into the cove. Only quick  
thinking and quicker action on the part of Moray and the crew of the _Lady  
MacBeth_ had put an end to the battle.  
Now the pirates were dead or in chains, but they'd cut a vicious swath  
through the sleep-fogged streets. Those townsfolk not busy tending the wounded  
were hard at work by the gallows. The surviving pirates would hang, all but  
Santiago and his first mate.  
Moray would just as soon see them swing as well, but the Englishman  
Benedict Tate was offering a modest fortune for the chance to deliver his own  
justice upon Bloody Pete, and the price on Santiago's head by the governor of  
Jamaica would go a considerable way toward repairing the town, the stipulation  
being that he was delivered whole and alive.  
"Lock them away," Moray said.  
The soldiers obeyed, conducting Santiago and Bloody Pete to the  
prison, where they could stew and fester amid the rat-ridden filth for a while.  
Best of all, the tiny barred window afforded a view of the gallows, so they could  
watch their companions hang.  
Leaving Tag to oversee the rest, Moray hurried back to the governor's  
mansion. Giselle Nejou met him at the door, visibly trying to hold up. The poor  
girl had lost her mother when she was too young to remember, and now it  
seemed certain she would lose her father as well.  
"How is he?" Moray asked. A useless question, that of a bystander, but  
what else was there to say? He was no physician. The finest on the island were  
already in attendance.  
"They say his heart ... his heart gave out," Giselle managed before  
breaking into a fit of sobbing.  
Moray embraced her, stroking her hair while he looked past her to the  
door of Henri's chamber. His heart. He hadn't even reached the plaza before  
collapsing. It had been Moray who led the soldiers and rallied the townspeople  
for defense, while Henri was rushed home.  
"He wants to see you," Giselle said against his coat, her voice muffled.  
He lifted her chin. Her face was smeared with soot and gunpowder-  
residue, making him look down and swipe a hand across his coat. It came away  
black.  
"Here, now," he said kindly, finding his handkerchief and offering it to  
her. "I've made a mess of you."  
"Will he ... will he be all right?"  
How he wished he could tell her the consoling lies! But he could not.  
"You must be brave, Giselle. He would want you to be brave. Remember, you  
won't be alone. I'll look after you."  
"Do you promise?"  
"I swear."  
She nodded, and hurried off to wash her face while he went into the  
room where his dear friend lay dying. Henri's sharp gaze fell upon him.  
"Moray." It came out a croak.  
The physicians were hovering over him, mixing medicines, but he could  
tell just by their movements that they knew it was futile.  
"Is this farewell, Henri?"  
"I want you to take care of Giselle," he gasped.  
"You needn't even ask." He found Henri's hand and squeezed it.  
"Marry her."  
"What?!"  
"I want her to have a husband who will always be there for her. Who  
will _always_ be there." His words were coming with more difficulty, his chest  
heaving.  
"You know."  
Despite his pain, Henri smiled. "Do you take me for a fool? I've known  
for years. Will you? Marry her, and be governor after me. The king will approve  
it. You'll take care of my daughter, of my island. I know you won't fail me,  
Moray."  
"Henri --"  
"Don't fail me, Moray." His breath turned into a wheeze, his right hand  
clutched Moray's. "Ah. God."  
"Henri!"  
"Father!" Giselle rushed in. "No!"  
"Isa ... belle ..." his final word gusted out of him, and his lips curved  
into a smile before going slack.  
"Oh, mon pere!" Giselle threw herself to her knees, wailing.  
Moray folded Henri Nejou's limp hands across his chest. "I won't fail  
you, old friend."  
  
* *  
  
**Veradoga Island  
May 2000  
  
** "I know what must be done," Reaper said.  
Brand, who had been trying with little success to make sense of a  
strange book scavenged from the _Coral_ -- colored ink pictures chronicling the  
adventures of foolishly-dressed humans who flew without the benefit of wings,  
shot beams from their eyes, and had unlikely combats against equally ludicrous  
villains -- tossed it aside and rose.  
"Yes, leader?"  
Reaper stood slowly, stretching to his full impressive height. He  
extended his wings until it seemed every dusky feather was splayed, taking up  
fully the width of the cave. Then he exhaled and relaxed, and when he turned, his  
air of melancholy was gone.  
"It does not serve our clan to hide away in this cave," he said, "preying  
on small ships when we have so few warriors. We must seek out others of our  
kind."  
"I was just thinking that very thing, my love," said Melusine, wringing  
her hair as she emerged from the tunnel that led to the seacave.  
"What of the Rogue?" Brand demanded. "And our revenge?"  
"How would you have me find him?" Reaper countered. "You have  
seen the maps; little of this world remains unexplored. He could be anywhere.  
Could be far inland, places we would not wish to venture. In time, he may come  
to us. Until then, we must look first to the survival of our clan. The  
_continuance_ of our clan."  
"And if we are the last?" Brand asked. "The last of our seafaring race?"  
"Then we die out," Reaper said. "But we do not die out in hiding and  
cowardice."  
  
* *  
  
**St. Gilbert  
February 1723  
  
** He saw a shape against the moon, and his blood chilled.  
"Demona," he breathed.  
"Husband?" Giselle queried.  
Moray flinched, not yet accustomed to having any other woman call  
him by that title, and in the same voice of love and respect that his dear Gruoch  
had used. Or perhaps it was that he was not yet accustomed to being wed again.  
It did not seem right. Every night, when he got into bed beside Giselle, or took  
her in his arms, or made love to her, a mantle of odd dread settled over him.  
The shape was gone, if indeed it had ever been there. But its shadow  
remained cast on his heart, making his skin creep with apprehension.  
"What is it?" Giselle joined him at the window, which looked down on  
the serene town.  
"Nothing," he told her. "I thought I saw something, that's all. A bird, or  
a cloud on the wind."  
"Are you ready to come to bed?"  
He patted her hand where it rested on his arm. "Soon."  
She smiled at him, then returned to her writing-desk. "Another letter  
from Captain Tate," she reported. "He's yet unable to come for his first mate, and  
wishes us to hold him a while more. The settling of his father's estate is taking  
longer than anticipated."  
"Is there any news from the governor of Jamaica?"  
"He promises the reward for Santiago soon," Giselle said, sifting  
through papers until she came to the appropriate one. "But the state of his  
treasuries is severely limited at the moment."  
Moray sighed. "We've held those men for a year and a half. I could just  
order them hanged myself and be done with it."  
"They deserve to rot in their cell!" she said hotly. "A swift death is too  
good for them!"  
"Perhaps you're right." He was about to go to her, when the shape  
passed across the moon's pale face again.  
This time there was no mistaking it. A gargoyle.  
But not Demona. No, even in that brief glimpse, he could tell.  
"You still seem troubled."  
Before he could answer, the dark gargoyle folded its wings tightly and  
dove. Dove toward the town, toward the center of town. And now another one  
appeared, whose phoenix-like wings wreathed its body in scarlet and gold.  
That blazing light poured through the window, illuminating the room.  
Giselle gasped.  
"What --?" she began.  
Moray clutched her by the upper arms, setting her away from the  
window. "Stay here," he ordered. "I must attend to this."  
Once again, gunfire and screams echoed through the streets of St.  
Gilbert, this time counterpointed with gargoyle roars.  
"Where are you going?"  
He strode past her, yanked open one of the drawers of the writing desk,  
and removed a brass-fitted leather case. From it, he took the scrolls he'd kept  
since that long-ago battle against the _Saunders_, scrolls that had been buried alive  
with him on a desolate stretch of beach, carried with him to Europe and back.  
Scrolls that might now come in very handy indeed.  
"Don't leave me!" Giselle threw herself in his path.  
"I will return," he promised, pulling her into a quick hug and pressing a  
kiss on the top of her head. "You needn't worry about that."  
"Or let me come with you!"  
"No!" He kissed her again, this time on the lips. "Wait here. I'll be back  
soon."  
That cold dread became a weight of ice. He held Giselle to him, fearful  
that it was some premonition, that he would only see her again with the spark of  
life snuffed from her eyes.  
"Go to the wine cellar," he told her. "Do not come out, until I come for  
you." It was as safe a place as any, if anyplace could truly be called safe.  
He'd heard of these gargoyles many times over the years. They'd  
supposedly been massacred in 1720, but a few had survived, making up for their  
lesser numbers by committing even more brutal atrocities against unprotected  
villages as they made their way eastward. Now it seemed they had reached St.  
Gilbert.  
"And here," he vowed as he left the governor's mansion and headed into  
town, "here your rampage ends."  
By the time he reached the squat brick building that housed the main  
office o' the watch, half of St. Gilbert was in flames. The fire-winged gargoyle  
flew from rooftop to rooftop, setting his burning sword to dry wood that went up  
like tinder. The people were in high panic, the soldiers caught unprepared for the  
task of dealing with airborne monstrous foes.  
As Moray raced into the town square, he saw a giant black-cowled  
figure looming over the tiny window that gave onto the prison. The light danced  
eerily on his skeletal features, and those soldiers who had their wits about them  
enough to attack fell back in superstitious terror from that death-mask visage.  
Bone-white fingers wrapped around the bars. With a bellow of exertion,  
the dark gargoyle tore the entire iron window free from the bricks.  
Two others swooped down. One was a female with a sinuous fishtail  
and green batlike wings; she carried a barrel and dumped it as she passed  
overhead. The contents splashed onto a crowd of soldiers and townsfolk,  
dousing them in oil.  
Then the fiery one dove low, casting embers from his sword that lit the  
oil. An inferno exploded in the square, then broke apart into a shattered flaming  
phalanx as the burning victims ran in all directions.  
Moray saw a tiny one, a demonic child-imp, capering and clapping on  
the crossbar of the gallows. A three-headed beast with gnashing, foaming jaws  
tore at fleeing humans.  
The dark one thrust a long arm into the cell and hooked out a man. Not  
Santiago but the other, the one called Bloody Pete. The gargoyle's reaction was  
horrific.  
"You?" he bellowed, shaking the man by the neck. "_You_?!?" Without  
giving the man a chance to speak, the gargoyle punched his claws through the  
man's chest and ripped him apart as if he'd been made of cloth and straw.  
"Stop!" Moray shouted above the din. He put a pistol shot into the dark  
gargoyle's shoulder to get his attention, quite effectively as hot-white eyes pinned  
him like knives.  
"We will have revenge for our clan!" The wound didn't seem to affect  
him at all, not hampering his effort to reach back into the cell and pull out the  
panic-stricken Emil Santiago.  
Moray aimed with his other pistol. Just as he shot, something heavy  
slammed into his back and drove him face-first to the cobblestones. He rolled,  
groaning, and saw the female gargoyle circle around. She'd struck him with her  
tail, a blow that might have killed a mortal man.  
"Let them all burn and die!" the flame-winged one cried, brandishing  
his sword. People fled before him, perhaps mistaking him for the wrathful  
avenging angel of an angry God. His brow ridges gave him away, as did the split  
hooves and the tail visible beneath his robes.  
Tag was at his side then, helping him to sit up. His back protested, his  
legs were useless meat, and Moray realized that his spine had snapped.  
"Get ... get out of here," he ordered Tag. "Get your family to safety."  
"Already done," Tag replied. "My place is with you."  
The dark gargoyle had turned away from them, seeing them as no  
further threat when the object of his fury was so close at hand. Emil Santiago,  
who had borne his capture and captivity with sneering bravado, blubbered like  
an infant as the gargoyle's huge hand closed over his face.  
"For my clan," the grim specter said, and clenched his fist, crushing the  
front of Santiago's skull like an eggshell.  
He shoved the man away. Santiago, blind and in immense agony but  
still alive, reeled against the wall with groping, outstretched arms.  
The gargoyle picked up a scythe that had been propped against a post.  
Now, with that weapon in hand and his wings drawn about himself like a vast  
black cloak, he was every inch Death's image. He swung the scythe on a slant,  
the curved blade taking Santiago on the right collarbone and carrying clear  
through to the left hip.  
All of the gargoyles raised their voices in a howl of triumph.  
"I'll heal," Moray said urgently to Tag. "Save yourself!"  
Now that their main task was done, Moray expected them to go into a  
frenzy of bloodlust, so that nothing would be left come daybreak but dead bodies  
and smoldering wreckage.  
"Fire!" Tag yelled.  
Moray, startled, saw that several of his men, loyal ex-sailors who, like  
Tag, had brought their families to settle in St. Gilbert, had wheeled cannons into  
the square. The first bucked and jerked back as it went off, the cannonball  
smashing through the brick wall only a few inches from the dark gargoyle. A  
shower of broken masonry poured down, pummeling him to his knees.  
"Reaper!" the female screeched.  
The flame-winged one went for the next cannon, perhaps meaning to  
light the gunpowder and blow it and the men to pieces. Moray was still holding  
his other pistol, and only his legs were paralyzed. He fired, tearing a hole in a  
wing, and the gargoyle veered in his flight.  
Bricks went everywhere as the dark one lunged upright. "Go!" he  
shouted to his clan, waving to the heavens. He bounded to an overturned wagon,  
then to a burning rooftop. The beams creaked and sagged beneath his weight,  
sending up a swirl of sparks. He leapt to safety, spreading his wings, just as the  
building collapsed.  
The three-headed beast glided past on stubby wings, the imp-child  
clinging to its back.  
"Fire!" Tag yelled again. The second cannonball clipped the female's  
tail, scraping loose a path of scales.  
Moray tested his legs. The feeling was starting to come back. "They're  
going. Let them. We have to put out these fires or we'll lose the town."  
Tag marshaled men to begin hauling buckets. "Where is Giselle?"  
"Safe," Moray said ... then looked at the governor's mansion, entirely  
engulfed in flames. "Dear God! Giselle!"  
"Where?" Tag was already six paces that way.  
"The wine cellar! I told her to go to the wine cellar!" He forced himself  
to stand, his knees wavering and then buckling.  
First Gruoch, now Giselle; was every wife of his destined to be trapped  
in a burning building? Pins and needles coursed down his limbs but he made  
himself run after Tag.  
The orchards were ablaze. The garden, where they sometimes made  
love amid the fragrant flowers in the cool summer evenings, was a hellish  
landscape.  
Tag plunged through the doors, arms crossed over his face to shield it.  
Moray stumbled on the steps and struck his forehead, fighting to stay conscious  
as blackness tried to encroach upon his vision.  
That battle, he lost.  
When he next opened his eyes, the first sight they beheld was the  
blameless blue sky through a window framed with the blackened remnants of  
white curtains. Bonita Alvarez leaned over him anxiously, bringing a damp cloth  
to his face.  
"Giselle --?" he asked. "Tag?"  
She shook her head solemnly, and her dark eyes flicked to the corner of  
the room. He followed her gaze and there was Tag, slumped in a chair with his  
arm in a sling, bandages swathing his head, his hair mostly burned away.  
"Giselle," he murmured, brokenly.  
Tag moved, waking. The one eye not covered by bandages opened and  
found Moray. "I'm sorry."  
"Did you find her?"  
"In the wine cellar. The flames never reached her, but the smoke ..."  
"Tag brought her out," Bonita said quietly. "He thought you wouldn't  
want to leave her there."  
"Thank you," Moray said.  
He lay back and closed his eyes, not wanting to show them the sudden  
and intense burst of anger that came over him. Here he was, feeling whole and  
sound with not a pain or an ache anywhere, healed when he should have been  
dead. Here he was, alive and well, while pretty Giselle had died alone in the dark  
and the heat and the choking smoke.  
That same day, he toured the ruins of St. Gilbert.  
The orchards had mostly burned, but the tree where he'd found her  
dangling like the ripest and sweetest fruit of the island was mostly unmarked. He  
had Giselle buried beneath that tree, and in the spring the orange blossoms  
would cover her grave.  
"You had these with you," Bonita said after the funeral, giving him the  
scrolls. "I do not know what they are, but Tag said you might want them."  
"Yes," Moray said, tucking them into his coat. "I have a use for one of  
them, at least."  
That night, Giselle only hours under the earth, he set out.  
They couldn't have gone far. They had no ship, no human crew to  
protect them during the day. St. Gilbert wasn't close enough to any other islands  
to have let them reach safety by air.  
It took him until dusk, but he found them, just waking from their  
wooden sleep in an undercut bluff next to a bubbling spring.  
"It _is_ he!" the female said, unafraid after sizing him up and seeing  
him unarmed. "You spoke true, Brand, it is the one they call the Scottish  
Rogue."  
"I am," Moray said.  
"What do you want, human?" the fire-winged one, Brand, asked. "Had  
you not enough last night?"  
"That's why I've come. There's something left unfinished."  
"Do you threaten us?" The dark one called Reaper drew himself up tall  
and proud. "We've had our revenge; it is no concern of yours."  
"This is not about your revenge, but mine!" He unrolled the scroll.  
"Sorcery!" the female gasped.  
Moray began to read the words of Latin.  
The female came at him, so he pointed at her. Ladies first. A small  
cyclone of tawny-gold radiance whirled up from the earth, trapping her  
immobile.  
"Melusine!" Reaper reached for her, but the moment his hands passed  
through the cocoon of magic, he too was frozen in place.  
The spell expanded, enclosing the young one, the beast, and finally  
Brand. They screamed soundlessly. Their eyes shone blue-white and searing  
turquoise in protest. But the woven wind of magic tightened around them, their  
flesh becoming stiff and solid wood, their skin taking on muted colors as of  
weathered paint.  
_"Vos Concludo penes somno ut Ligno donec mare fervat!"_ Moray  
finished.  
It was done.  
  
* *  
  
**Manhattan  
May 2000  
  
** After telling her about the spell, he was silent for so long that Birdie  
was sure he'd fallen asleep. But then the sheets rustled as he moved, and she  
sensed him looking at her in the dim light shed by the single bulb in the  
bathroom.  
"That," she said, "is one hell of a story."  
"Yet you believe me."  
"Every word. Why wouldn't I? I've seen plenty of weirdness myself,  
mister, and you don't strike me as the sort of a guy who'd lie without a good  
reason."  
His sigh stirred her hair. "I thought telling it would hurt nearly as much  
as living it, but instead, I feel better."  
She kissed him, a warm, wet, openmouthed Birdie-kiss. "Glad to hear  
it."  
"Is there nothing that astounds you, woman?"  
"Very little. What'd you do with them? The Pirate Clan? After they  
were frozen?"  
"For all they'd done, I could not bring myself to kill them. I understood  
too well what had driven them to their deeds, and hoped that by sparing them, it  
might someday break the cycle of vengeance." He sighed again. "It seems,  
however, to have only delayed it."  
"Because they're still out there."  
"Yes," he said heavily. "They're still out there."  
  
* *  
  
**The End.**   
  



End file.
